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STEWARDSHIP 


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Five  Bible  Studies  of 
MAN'S  RELATION  TO  THINGS 

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Stewardship 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


Five  Bible  Studies  of 


MAN’S  RELATION  TO  THINGS 


By  GUY  L.  MORRILL 
Author  of 

“The  Four-Fold  Task”; 

“You  and  Yours:  God’s  Purpose  in  Things.” 


Second  Printing 
Revised  1923 

Printed  By 

THE  HUBBARD  PRESS 
AUBURN,  N.  Y. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


https://archive.org/details/lifeasstewardshiOOmorr 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Foreword . iv 

I  Do  You  Own  What  You  Possess? 

II  The  Separated  Portion 

III  Budget  Making . 43 

IV  The  Miracle  of  Money . 71 


V  Business  for  Profits  or  Service 


88 


Foreword 

These  studies,  while  especially  adapted  for  young 
people’s  groups  and  societies,  are  suited  for  use  in 
Sunday  School  classes  and  in  adult  groups.  Some 
pastors  will  desire  to  make  them  the  basis  of  a  course 
of  addresses  in  the  midweek  service.  In  Young  Peo¬ 
ple’s  Societies,  they  may  be  substituted  for  the  regular 
topic  for  five  meetings.  It  is  earnestly  urged  that 
when  used  in  a  course  for  a  series  of  weeks,  the  whole 
membership  be  supplied  with  copies  of  the  book  and 
encouraged  to  read  the  chapters  for  themselves. 

Bibles  should  be  constantly  used.  All  Scripture 
references  should  be  read.  Many  will  want  to  memo¬ 
rize  the  more  important  texts.  The  purpose  of  these 
studies  is  not  merely  to  impart  information  but  to 
establish  the  practice  of  stewardship  in  the  lives  of 
the  students.  This  will  mean  a  new  and  richer  exper¬ 
ience  of  God  and  new  power  in  the,  lives  of  many. 
Stewardship  practice  will  revolutionize  your  church. 
It  will  contribute  to  the  understanding  and  to  the  so¬ 
lution  of  many  of  the  problems  of  the  social  order. 

In  teaching  this  course  or  for  sermons  preached  in 
connection  with  its  use  in  study  groups,  consult  “You 
and  Yours — God’s  Purpose  In  Things”,  Morrill;  “Prop¬ 
erty,  Its  Duties  and  Rights” ;  “A  Man  and  His  Money”, 
Calkins;  “Modern  Stewardship  Sermons”,  The  Abing¬ 
don  Press;  “Fundamentals  of  Prosperity,”  Babson; 
“The  Acquisitive  Society”,  Tawney;  “The  Untried 
Door”,  Roberts;  “Money  Talks”,  McGarrah;  “Money 
the  Acid  Test”,  McConaughy;  “Christian  Steward- 
hip”,  McGonaughy;  “The  Message  of  Stewardship”, 
Cushman.  A  Leader’s  Manual — “How  to  Use  ‘Life 
As  A  Stewardship’  ”  and  a  Packet  of  Helps  may  be 
obtained  from  the  Stewardship  Department,  156  Fifth 
Avenue,  New  York  by  those  intending  to  teach  the 
book  or  use  it  in  group  discussion.  Both  the  manual 
and  the  packet  will  be  sent  for  ten  cents.  Remittance 
must  accompany  each  order. 


THE  CHURCH  NEEDS 
NOT  HEARERS  ONLY  BUT  DOERS  OF 
THE  WORD  OF  STEWARDSHIP 

STUDY  I 

DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS? 


OU  say  “My  house,  my  bank  account,  my 
WS  property,  my  salary,  my  clothes,  my 
y  books,  my  education.”  Have  you  used 

A  the  right  possessive  pronoun?  Are  these 

things  which  you  possess,  yours?  Do 
you  own  what  you  possess  ? 

Do  you  believe  that  you  may  do  what  you  like  with 
what  you  have?  Your  brains,  your  strength,  your  skill, 
your  talent,  your  time,  your  life,  your  money,  are  these 
your  own  to  use  as  you  please?  These  questions  raise 
issues  so  great  that  before  you  answer,  let  us  see  what 
the  Bible  teaches  concerning  a  man’s  relation  to  his 
possessions. 

Your  answer  to  these  questions  will  color  and  in¬ 
fluence  your  concept  of  God  and  determine  your  whole 
philosophy  of  life.  If  you  answer  “Yes,  I  own  what  I 
possess,  it  is  mine  to  do  with  as  I  like,”  you  literally 
deny  God  and  his  sovereignty,  and  life  ceases  to  be  a 
partnership  with  the  Eternal  and  becomes  a  self- 
centred  scramble  after  possessions.  It  is  certain  if  you 
say  “Yes”  to  these  questions  you  cut  yourself  off  from 
Christianity — the  religion  of  the  New  Testament.  The 
principle  of  man’s  stewardship  and  accountability  for 
his  possessions  is  the  very  heart  of  the  teaching  of 
Christ.  “The  kingdom  of  heaven  is  likened  unto  a 
certain  king  which  would  take  account  of  his  servants.” 
(Matt.  18:23,  See  also  Luke  16:2;  Romans  14:7-12.) 
“We  labor  that  whether  present  or  absent  we  may  be 
accepted  of  him.  For  we  must  all  appear  before  the 


6 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


judgment  seat  of  Christ ;  that  everyone  may  receive  the 
things  done  in  his  body,  according  to  that  he  hath  done, 
whether  it  be  good  or  bad.”  (2  Corinthians  5:9,  10). 
The  New  Testament  teaching  makes  it  plain  that  we 
are  to  give  an  accounting  to  Another  for  all  we  are  and 
for  the  things  we  possess. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  you  say  “No!”  to  the  questions 
at  the  beginning  of  this  study,  if  you  say  “I  do  not  own 
what  I  possess.  I  may  not  do  as  I  like  with  what  I 
possess,”  you  are  acknowledging  a  responsibility  that 
will  need  all  the  light  that  the  Bible  can  throw  upon  it, 
to  discharge  it  faithfully.  What  does  the  Bible  say 
about  our  possessions,  ownership,  our  talents,  time, 
strength,  wealth,  money,  giving,  and  our  stewardship? 

The  Bible  has  a  surprising  amount  to  say  about  ma¬ 
terial  and  personal  possessions  and  their  bearing  on 
the  building  of  Christian  character  and  the  Kingdom 
of  God.  God  intends  that  we  should  have  and  use  and 
enjoy  his  gifts  ourselves.  The  things  entrusted  to  us 
are  for  the  enlargement  of  our  own  lives  and  their 
genuine  enrichment  as  well  as  for  the  Kingdom  uses. 
He  does  not  require  that  all  men  become  ascetics. 
Christ  is  not  asking  for  renunciation  but  for  dedication. 
Men  do  not  need  literally  to  abandon  their  worldly 
possessions  in  order  to  follow  Christ.  What  is  re¬ 
quired  is  the  stewardship  attitude — recognition  and 
acknowledgment  that  God  is  the  owner  and  can  de¬ 
termine  what  to  do  with  his  own.  God  wants  to  build 
character  by  the  use  of  his  gifts.  When  Jesus  said 
“Whosoever  he  be  of  you  that  forsaketh  not  all  he 
hath,  he  cannot  be  my  disciple.”  (Luke  14:33)  he  was 
making  a  statement  about  attitudes  and  acceptance  of 
the  stewardship  principles,  he  was  not  asking  people 
to  abandon  their  possessions.  Dr.  Robertson  says 
this  passage  needs  to  be  interpreted  spiritually.  “The 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS 


7 


ties  must  be  broken  which  a  man  makes  in  his  natural 
life  between  himself  and  his  goods.  He  must  cease  to 
be  owner  of  them  in  his  own  reckoning  and  become 
only  a  steward.  He  must  think  of  them  as  God’s  and 
as  to  be  spent  not  according  to  his  own  will  but  the 
will  of  God.  Now  this  change  from  owner  to  steward, 
if  true  and  complete,  is  felt  to  be  a  real  renouncing  of 
all  that  he  hath.  It  is  hard  to  do  so,  often  as  hard  for 
the  poor  man  who  renounces  earthly  hopes  as  for  the 
rich  who  renounces  actual  possessions.”  It  is  needful, 
then,  that  we  know  what  the  Bible  has  to  say  about 
the  matter  of  stewardship.  (Read  carefully  Matthew 
22:15-21;  Romans  14:12;  I  Cor  9:17;  Luke  16:12; 
Luke  12:36-48;  I  Peter  4:10;  Matthew  22:  34-40; 
Matthew  25:14-46).  We  shall  try  to  summarize  the 
teaching  of  the  Bible  concerning  stewardship  in  the 
following  five  statements. 

A — God  Is  The  Owner  Of  All  Things 

Many  Bible  passages  definitely  assert  the  divine 
ownership.  Genesis  14:22,  “God  most  high,  possessor 
of  heaven  and  earth”;  Deuteronomy  10:14,  “Behold, 
unto  Jehovah  thy  God  belongeth  the  heavens  and  the 
heaven  of  heavens,  the  earth,  with  all  that  is  therein”  ; 
Psalm  50:10-11,  “For  every  beast  of  the  forest  is  mine 
and  the  cattle  on  a  thousand  hills.  I  know  all  the  birds 
of  the  mountains,  and  the  wild  beasts  of  the  field  are 
mine” ;  Haggai  2  :8,  “The  silver  is  mine  and  the  gold 
is  mine,  saith  Jehovah  of  hosts;  Psalm  24:10,  “The 
earth  is  the  Lord’s  and  the  fulness  thereof” ;  I  Chron¬ 
icles  29:11-14,  “Thine,  O  LORD  is  the  greatness  and 
the  power,  and  the  glory,  and  the  victory,  and  the 
majesty;  for  all  that  is  in  the  heaven  and  in  the  earth 
is  thine;  thine  is  the  kingdom,  O  LORD,  and  thou  art 
exalted  as  head  above  all.  Both  riches  and  honour 


8 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


come  of  thee,  and  thou  reignest  over  all;  and  in  thine 
hand  is  power  and  might;  and  in  thine  hand  it  is  to 
make  great  and  to  give  strength  unto  all.  Now  there¬ 
fore,  our  God,  we  thank  thee,  and  praise  thy  glorious 
name.  But  who  am  I,  and  what  is  my  people,  that  we 
should  be  able  to  offer  so  willingly  after  this  sort?  For 
all  things  come  of  thee,  and  of  thine  own  have  we  given 
thee”;  (Leviticus  25:23)  “The  land  shall  not  be  sold 
forever,  for  the  land  is  mine”.  God  owns  all  things. 
He  has  never  passed  title  to  any  man. 

Not  only  does  God  own  the  earth  and  all  that  is 
therein  because  he  created  it,  but  he  owns  man  as  well. 
“The  world  and  they  that  dwell  therein”  belong  to  God. 
“All  souls  are  mine.”  (Ezekiel  18:4)  All  nations  are 
his  people  by  fact  of  creation. 

Consider  as  fully  as  time  permits,  God’s  ownership 
of  all  men  as  resting  upon  redemption  as  well  as  crea¬ 
tion.  No  man,  certainly  no  Christian  man,  may  say, 
“I  may  do  as  I  please;  I  am  my  own  master.”  “For 
one  is  your  master,  even  Christ.”  (Matthew  23  :8)  See 
I  Corinthians,  6 : 19,  20;  I  Peter,  1:18,  19;  Colossians  I: 
13-18. 

Not  only  does  God  own  the  earth  and  our  persons 
but  also  our  talents,  our  time  and  our  strength.  It 
is  God  that  imparteth  strength  and  skill  and  wisdom 
to  man.  He  giveth  men  degrees  of  ability  and  talents. 
“Who  maketh  thee  to  differ  from  others?”  (I  Cor¬ 
inthians  4:7.)  We  have  nothing  of  abilty,  privilege, 
opportunity,  property,  we  have  nothing  that  we  have 
not  received  from  God.  Especial  talent  is  not  some¬ 
thing  we  have  of  ourselves ;  it  is  God  that  hath 
made  us  and  not  we  ourselves.  We  are  his  people. 
(Psalm  100:3.)  Paul  says  in  Ephesians  4:11,  that  God 
made  men  to  differ.  We  are  constantly  reminded  in 
the  Bible  that  it  is  God  who  has  made  us  with  varying 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  9 


talents.  “What  hast  thou  that  thou  didst  not  receive?” 
(1  Corinthians  4:7)  God  says  “I  have  created  the 
smith  that  bloweth  the  coals  in  the  fire.”  (Isaiah 
54:16).  See  also  Exodus  31:1-6;  35:30-35;  Isaiah 
28:23-29;  Acts  6:1-4;  Ephesians  2:10;  I  Corinthians 
12  :4-8. 

We  sometimes  say  that  what  a  man  creates  should 
belong  to  him.  But  everything  a  man  makes  re¬ 
quires  raw  materials,  physical  strength  and  skill. 
Where  did  these  come  from?  (Genesis  1:1)  “In  the 
beginning  God  created;”  (Ephesians  3:9)  “God,  who 
created  all  things.”  If  God  created  all  the  raw  material 
as  well  as  all  the  physical  strength  and  skill  of  man 
himself,  then  all  the  things  man  makes  belong  to  God. 
“Men  may  call  themselves  producers  but  never  without 
qualifications.  What  they  make  is  made  out  of  that 
which  already  exists,  by  the  powers  which  God  has 
placed  at  their  disposal,  under  the  blessing  of  God’s 
care.  They  are  agents  in  continued  creation  but  they 
are  never  creators.  One  may  plant,  another  water,  but 
‘God  giveth  the  increase.’  In  the  final  analysis,  no  man 
has  anything  which  God  has  not  bestowed,  either  in 
his  personality  or  in  material  possessions.  And  most 
men  are  never  anything  more  than  receivers,  acquirers 
and  users.”  Luther  finely  stated  this  in  his  answer  to 
the  question,  “What  does  the  first  article  of  the  Apost¬ 
les’  creed  mean — I  believe  in  God  the  Father  Almighty, 
maker  of  heaven  and  earth?’’  His  answer  was,  “I  be¬ 
lieve  that  God  has  created  me  and  all  that  exists;  that 
He  has  given  and  still  preserves  to  me  my  body  and 
soul  with  all  my  limbs  and  senses,  my  reason  and  all 
the  faculties  of  my  mind,  together  with  my  raiment, 
food,  home  and  family  and  all  my  property  without  any 
merit  or  worthiness  in  me,  for  all  which  I  am  in  duty 
bound  to  thank,  praise,  serve  and  obey  Him.”  “Every- 


10 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


thing  which  one  possesses  is  either  a  bestowment,  hav¬ 
ing  its  source  outside  the  recipient,  or  it  is  an  achieve¬ 
ment  through  the  use  of  forces  or  material  which  the 
user  did  not  originate.  However  large  the  personal  in¬ 
vestment,  nothing  which  anyone  has  is  his  own  indepen¬ 
dent  creation.  Within  limitations,  predetermined,  it 
is  possible  for  a  person  to  use  forces  and  things,  direct 
their  influence  or  combine  their  qualities  and  realize 
results,  anticipated  or  unexpected.  The  silk  or  wool 
which  clothes  us  was  patiently  elaborated  by  worm  or 
sheep  and  is  its  cast-off  garment,  reconstructed  to  suit 
our  requirements.  The  simple  prayer,  “Give  us  this 
day  our  daily  bread,”  requires  for  its  physical  fulfill¬ 
ment  that  our  tables  be  supplied  with  productions  from 
the  mineral,  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms,  gathered 
from  every  clime,  and  in  the  production  or  transporta¬ 
tion  of  which  have  been  utilized  the  operation  of  every 
law  of  life,  every  principle  of  chemistry  and  physics, 
every  form  of  mechanical  device,  the  stored  energy  of 
unnumbered  ages,  the  constructive  thought,  experi¬ 
mentation  and  cooperation  of  thousands  of  men,  and 
the  invested  billions  of  dollars  which  make  possible  the 
maintenance  of  the  material  accessories  of  civilization. 
Whatever  his  possessions  or  accumulations,  no  man 
has  originated  a  new  force  or  created  a  new  element.” 
(Principles  of  Stewardship — J.  F.  Goucher.) 

It  is  God  who  giveth  us  the  power  to  make  money. 
(Deut.  8:17,  18)  “And  lest  thou  say  in  thy  heart,  my 
power  and  the  might  of  my  hand  hath  gotten  me  this 
wealth — thou  shalt  remember  Jehovah  thy  God,  for  it 
is  he  that  giveth  thee  power  to  get  wealth.”  (See  also 
Acts  14 :17 ;  Deut.  11 :13-17;  Jeremiah  14:22)  The  fact 
is,  that  “Every  good  gift  and  every  perfect  gift  is  from 
above,  coming  down  from  the  Father.”  (James  1:17). 
Our  health,  our  keen  eyesight,  our  nimble-mindedness, 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  1  1 


our  creative  powers,  our  educational  privilege,  our 
circumstances,  our  favorable  opportunities,  all  we  have 
is  from  God.  He  is  both  the  Source  and  the  Owner. 

The  parables  of  Jesus  emphasize  the  divine  owner¬ 
ship.  (See  Matthew  25:14-30;  Luke  19:11-27;  Mark 
12:1-9;  Luke  12:16-21). 

Thus  far  we  have  seen  how  the  Bible  everywhere 
teaches  and  enforces  the  doctrine  of  God’s  ownership 
of  all  things.  Nowhere  does  it  appear  that  God  ever 
gave  up  his  title  claim  to  the  whole  creation.  God 
has  never  vacated  his  property  rights  in  all  things. 
His  dominion  is  over  all  his  works,  an  everlasting 
dominion  (Daniel  4:34).  He  grants  to  man  dominion 
over  the  earth,  the  air,  the  water,  over  minerals, 
plants  and  animals  but  it  is  a  dominion  circumscribed 
by  God’s  continuing  rights  as  Owner.  Whenever  this 
divine  ownership  has  been  denied  and  men  have  arro¬ 
gantly  assumed  the  right  to  do  as  they  like  with 
themselves,  their  powers,  and  their  possessions,  have 
given  themselves  the  honour  and  the  glory,  God  hath 
brought  them  to  judgment.  (See  Daniel  7  :25-2 7  and 
4:25-37). 

B — Man  Is  A  Trustee  Or  Steward  Or  Partner  With 
God  In  The  Things  He  Possesses. 

Absolute  ownership  is  vested  in  God  only.  We  can 
never  annul  the  rights  of  the  divine  ownership,  and  this 
leads  directly  to  a  second  statement  of  the  Bible  about 
man’s  relation  to  his  money-possessions.  Whether 
recognized  and  acknowledged  or  not,  man  instead  of 
being  an  owner  is  a  steward — a  trustee — a  partner  of 
Another.  Man  is  only  the  administrator  of  his  pos¬ 
sessions  which  are  his  Partner’s  property. 

The  word  “steward”  as  used  in  the  New  Testament 
emphasizes  the  closeness  of  the  fellowship  with  God  in 


12 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


this  attitude  toward  one’s  possessions.  The  word 
translated  “steward”  (oikonomos)  is  an  oriental  word 
and  has  the  warm  quality  of  an  intimate  personal  rela¬ 
tion  and  trust.  While  the  dictionary  definition  of  a 
“steward”  is  “one  entrusted  with  management  of 
estates  or  affairs  not  his  own,”  unfortunately  the  word 
“steward”  has  come  to  carry  in  English  a  more  or  less 
menial,  servile  meaning.  It  comes  from  Anglo-Saxon 
“stigweard”,  literally,  a  “styward”  and  was  used  to 
designate  a  man  employed  to  manage  domestic  con¬ 
cerns — a  caretaker. 

The  New  Testament  word  “steward”  carries  nothing 
of  the  menial  or  servile.  The  oriental  steward  was  no 
flunky,  no  kitchen  scullion,  no  mercenary  satellite.  He 
was  the  trusted  confidant  of  his  master.  No  English 
word  quite  covers  the  oriental  implications  of  affection¬ 
ate,  brotherly  intimacy.  The  word  “trusteeship” 
carries  the  dignity  of  the  eastern  meaning  attaching  to 
stewardship.  But  it  is  too  cold  and  legal  to  carry  the 
intimacy  of  relationship  contained  in  the  thought  be¬ 
hind  the  word  “steward”  as  used  in  the  Bible.  There 
is  more  of  the  color  and  glow  of  personal  fellowship  in 
the  word  stewardship  than  is  found  in  the  idea  of 
trusteeship.  The  trustee  is  bound  by  the  letter  of  the 
deed.  He  is  held  under  legal  restriction.  It  is  the 
cold  hand  of  a  dead  man  that  irrevocably  determines 
his  action.  He  exercises  no  freedom.  The  letter 
must  be  obeyed. 

The  steward  in  the  New  Testament,  on  the  other 
hand,  is  expected  freely  to  decide  for  his  Master  and 
Lord.  He  interprets  the  mind  of  a  living  and  present 
Lord.  By  his  cordial  intimate  fellowship  with  his 
Master  he  understands  and  shares  the  mind  of  his 
Master.  The  Christian  steward  acts  with  the  fullest 
liberty  but  acts  with  the  mind  of  Christ.  Like  Paul  he 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  1  3 


says,  “I  live” — (it  is  my  decision  that  determines)  — 
“nevertheless  not  I  but  Christ  liveth  in  me.”  (I  am 
myself  but  I  am  Christ  because  I  have  his  mind).  The 
sanctions  of  the  steward’s  actions  are  not  legal  con¬ 
straints — letter  requirements — “What  is  written  in  the 
bond” — but  loyalty  to  his  Master  whose  he  is  and 
whom  he  serves.  There  is  no  other  compulsion  for 
the  Christian  steward  save  loving  loyalty.  There  is 
nothing  legalistic  about  his  services,  nothing  measured 
(love  doesn’t  measure),  nothing  of  casuistry  nor  of  so¬ 
phistication.  Stewardship  is  the  spontaneous,  full, 
glowing,  faithful  administration  of  all  life  and  of  all 
one’s  possessions  for  God,  the  real  owner.  It  becomes 
practically  a  partnership. 

Some  prefer  to  use  the'  word  “partner”  instead  of 
“steward,”  as  giving  in  modern  speech  the  intimacies 
of  the  oriental  word  and  avoiding  the  implications  of 
the  menial  now  associated  with  the  English  word 
“steward.”  We  may  properly  speak  of  our  steward¬ 
ship  as  a  partnership.  It  is  necessary  however  to  guard 
the  word  partner  at  two  points.  First,  it  suggests 
equality  but  the  idea  of  equality  is  not  to  be  connected 
with  our  stewardship.  Our  partnership  is  of  grace, 
God  still  remains  sovereign.  Second,  the  word  “part¬ 
ner”  suggests  sharing  in  what  is  one’s  own.  But  the 
essential  idea  behind  stewardship  is  God’s  unchanging 
ownership  of  all  things.  With  these  two  restrictions 
on  the  word,  partnership  may  be  substituted  for  the 
word  stewardship.  But  on  the  whole  it  were  probably 
wiser  to  retain  the  now  familiar  New  Testament  word. 

stewardship,  and  interpret  it  in  all  its  richness  and 
significance.  The  thing  to  see  under  this  second  head¬ 
ing  is  that  man  is  a  steward — a  trustee — God’s  part¬ 
ner  in  the  acquisition  and  use  of  the  things  he  possesses. 


14 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


C — Stewardship  Covers  Not  Only  Our  Money 

But  All  Life 

Stewardship  is  the  Christian  law  of  life.  It  does  not 
primarily  refer  to  property  and  money  though  it  in¬ 
cludes  these.  Paul  writes :  “Stewards  of  the  mysteries 
of  God.”  All  life  is  a  stewardship.  Vital  energy  in 
whatever  form — whether  physical  or  mental,  moral  or 
spiritual — is  a  trust  from  God.  (Read  1  Peter  4:10; 
Colossians  1:25).  The  royal  doctrine  of  stewardship 
has  been  too  often  narrowed,  as  though  it  were  a  ‘finan¬ 
cial  plan/  whereas  it  is  a  fundamental  principle  an 
attitude  which  underlies  the  whole  meaning  of  life 
itself.  It  is  related  to  material  things  only  because 
material  things  are  related  to  the  higher  life.  Stew¬ 
ardship  marks  a  man’s  attitude  toward  property  and 
income,  and  therefore  expresses  his  relation  to  the 
social  order.  ‘Much  of  one’s  stewardship  has  to  do 
with  the  common  duties  within  the  family  circle,  the 
intimate  associations  of  friendship,  the  service  rendered 
to  society,  and  patriotic  loyalties  to  the  state.  And, 
even  as  all  elements  enter  into  the  deposit  intrusted  to 
the  Christian  for  his  use,  so  also  the  administration  of 
his  stewardship  will  be  through  all  channels  (I  Cor. 
4:1),  not  by  giving  of  money  only,  but  also  of  service 
and  influence  and  prayer  and  the  witness  he  bears  to 
the  gospel  of  the  grace  of  God.  This  part  of  life’s 
output  should  far  overbalance  that  which  can  be  re¬ 
duced  to  dollars  and  cents.” 

The  New  Testament  concept  of  stewardship  in  its 
full  sweep  involves  all  the  factors  of  life.  The  stew¬ 
ardship  of  time,  of  strength,  of  skill,  of  special  talent, 
of  educational  and  social  privilege,  of  opportunity,  is 
equally  vital  with  the  stewardship  of  money.  “Life  is 
a  trust,  a  stewardship.  That  is  Jesus’  idea  of  being 
faithful,  which  we  have  so  pitifully  narrowed.  He  does 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  1  5 


not  talk  of  being  faithful  to  a  creed  or  a  commandment, 
but  of  being  faithful  in  what  has  been  committed  to  us. 
Life  is  not  just  a  probation  which  ends  in  reward  or 
punishment  in  another  world.  It  is  a  power  and  a 
possession  which  we  are  to  use.  God  has  made  us 
working  partners  in  His  plans  for  the  world.  The  New 
Testament  word  is  stewardship.”  This  thought  of  life 
as  a  great  trust,  has  many  sides. 

There  is  the  Stewardship  of  Time. — My  time  is  a 
trust.  Not  only  does  one  day  in  seven  belong  to  God 
but  all  days  are  his.  We  must  render  an  account  of  our 
time  as  well  as  our  talents.  Many  men  who  are  com- 
mendably  faithful  stewards  in  the  making  and  use  of 
money  are  wholly  unfaithful  in  their  stewardship  of 
time.  Engrossed  in  the  making  of  money,  in  the 
handling  of  things,  they  forget  that  God  has  a  right  to 
their  time.  They  often  even  neglect  to  give  him  the 
Sabbath  Day  as  his  day.  Much  less  do  they  separate 
unto  God  other  portions  of  their  time  for  the  giving  of 
counsel,  leadership  and  service  in  the  church  and  king¬ 
dom  work.  Discuss  as  fully  as  possible  the  steward¬ 
ship  of  time.  (See  Ecclesiastes  12  :1 ;  1  Peter  1 :17  ; 
4:1-5;  Ephesians  5:15,  16). 

Business  is  a  Stewardship.  The  stewardship  of  the 
New  Testament  did  not  deal  merely  with  giving  but 
with  every  phase  of  life.  Business  as  stewardship 
means  more  than  that  we  must  be  just  and  honest  in 
acquiring.  It  means  that  business  is  to  be  for  service 
and  not  personal  gain  merely.  (This  will  be  treated  at 
considerable  length  in  Study  V.  See  also  “You  and 
Yours — God’s  Purpose  in  Things,”  by  Guy  L. 
Morrill) . 

Prayer  is  a  Stewardship.  Prayer  is  the  largest  avail¬ 
able  source  of  power  known  to  or  committed  to  man. 
Prayer  is  a  trust  to  be  used  for  God  and  in  the  setting 


16 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


up  of  God’s  kingdom  on  earth.  “Prayer  is  the  soul’s 
sincere  desire  uttered  or  unexpressed.”  Stewardship 
makes  us  accountable  for  this  vast  privilege  and  oppor¬ 
tunity.  There  is  no  greater  service  than  prayer.  It  is 
the  most  exalted  stewardship. 

There  is  the  Stewardship  of  Life  as  Full  Time  Ser¬ 
vice.  “A  Christian  has  no  more  right  to  become  a 
carpenter,  a  stone  mason  or  a  doctor  without  a  ‘call’ 
than  he  has  to  become  a  minister  without  a  ‘call.’  To 
be  a  true  steward  of  life  means  that  the  farmer  will 
raise  crops,  the  teacher  will  teach  school  and  the  doctor 
will  perform  his  duties  with  exactly  the  same  purpose 
and  fidelity  as  is  to  be  expected  in  the  case  of  the  min¬ 
ister  or  the  missionary.  If  we  are  true  stewards  we 
make  every  ounce  of  our  energy  count  for  the  upbuild¬ 
ing  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  even  tho  our  particular  job 
in  the  vast  plan  may  be  delivering  groceries  or  wrap¬ 
ping  up  dry-goods.”  It  is  some  such  attitude  which  is 
involved  in  the  stewardship  of  life.  God  is  interested 
in  every  sort  of  activity  which  makes  this  world  a 
better  place  in  which  to  live  and  no  son  of  God  has  a 
right  to  invest  his  life  in  any  activity  which  does  not 
minister  to  his  fellow  men. 


A.  Church  Leader  "Recently  Said 

•EXPERIENCE  HAS  TAUGHT  ME  THAT  IN  THE  COUNTRY  YOU  CAN  GET 
THE  CONSECRATION  OF  LIFE  BUT  NO  MONEY;  IN  THE  CITY  YOU  CAN 
GET  MONEY  BUT  NOT  LIFE." 

McCauslevnd  Avenxie  Presbyterian  Church 

ST  LOUIS.  MO. 


Challenged  That  Statement  and  Said. 

•GOD  IS  NOT  LIMITED  IN  HIS  CALL  FOR  LIFE  SERVICE  BY  THE 


On  "If  »nv  man  will  do  his  will  he  shall  know"  The  Quesllon  Wes  Asked 
"Has  Anyone  Come  To  An  Irrevocable  Decision  To  Give  God  His  Lite  Service?” 


ONE  BY  ONE  SIXTEEN  YOUNG  PEOPLE  STOOD  UP 
Five  More  Have  Since  Joined  This  Volunteer  Be.nd 


However  there 
is  need  of  the 
study  of  life 
given  in  definite 
full  time  service 
as  ministers,  mis¬ 
sionary,  deacon¬ 
ess,  teacher,  etc. 
This  requires  a 
longer  and  more 
explicit  treat¬ 
ment  than  can  be 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  1  7 


given  here.  (See  special  treatments  of  vocations  and 
especially  the  call  to  the  ministry  or  to  the  missionary 
service.) 

There  is  the  Stewardship  of  Personality.  By  this,  is 
meant  all  those  facts  of  a  man’s  life,  such  as  privilege, 
opportunity,  experience,  talent,  education.  These  are 
to  be  recognized,  not  only  as  blessings  merely  to  be 
selfishly  enjoyed,  but  also  as  obligations  to  faithfully 
be  administered  as  a  stewardship.  The  educated  man 
is  for  that  very  reason,  under  obligation  to  render  high 
social  service  in  the  community.  A  person  possessed 
of  talent  is,  for  that  very  reason,  under  obligation  to 
make  his  talent  a  blessing  to  others.  The  French 
proverb,  “Noblesse  oblige,”  expresses  the  Christian’s 
law  of  living — “Rank  imposes  obligation.” 

There  is  the  Stewardship  of  Power.  All  the  elements 
of  strength  that  contribute  to  human  ability  are  not 
sources  of  success  to  be  exploited  for  one’s  own  profit, 
but  rather  are  trusts  to  be  administered  for  God’s  king¬ 
dom.  There  is  positively  no  limitation  to  the  claims  of 
this  stewardship  principle.  Physical  vigor,  intellectual 
strength,  spiritual  power — all  of  these  are  to  be  recog¬ 
nized  as  a  liability,  an  obligation,  or,  in  Christian 
phrase,  a  stewardship. 

Stewardship  is  the  Bible’s  way  of  saying  all  we  are 
and  have  belongs  to  God  and  is  entrusted  to  us  to  ad¬ 
minister  not  for  self  alone  but  to  administer  as  part¬ 
ners  with  God  for  the  work  of  his  kingdom.  It  is  pos¬ 
sible  to  deny  the  divine  ownership.  Men  do  deny  it 
and  deliberately  appropriate  for  their  own  purposes 
what  has  been  committed  to  them  as  a  trust.  The  con¬ 
sequence  of  such  denial  of  God’s  ownership  is  the  loss 
of  fellowship  with  him,  as  trustee,  steward  and  partner. 
To  lose  God  at  this  point  is  to  lose  him  altogether.  To 
deliberately  deny  God’s  ownership  of  all  things  is  to 


18 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


cut  away  the  life  entirely  from  the  divine  intercourse. 
It  is  to  declare  we  are  independent  of  God  and  owe 
him  no  obligation.  Some  do  deny  the  divine  owner¬ 
ship  very  deliberately.  For  every  person  who  deliber¬ 
ately  denies  God’s  vested  property  rights  in  all  things, 
there  are  a  host  of  people  who  piously  accede  to  this 
principle  in  theory  while  they  deny  it  in  practice.  In 
their  prayers,  their  worship,  their  hymns,  their  re¬ 
ligious  testimony  they  affirm 

“All  that  we  have  is  thine  alone, 

A  trust,  O  Lord,  from  thee.” 

But  in  their  actual  living  they  use  their  possessions 
as  if  these  things  belonged  to  them,  and  as  if  they 
could  use  what  they  had  as  they  please.  They  have  no 
sense  of  trusteeship,  they  make  no  acknowledgment  of 
their  stewardship.  They  spend  their  time,  their  talents, 
their  strength,  their  energies,  their  life,  their  money  as 
if  these  all  were  their  own  to  do  with  as  they  may  de¬ 
sire.  It  is  not  enough  piously  to  say  “Oh  yes!  God 
owns  all  things,”  and  then  neglect  the  acknowledgment 
of  our  trusteeship,  our  stewardship  and  plan  to  use  our 
possessions  as  we  please.  But  God,  the  Owner,  has  put 
things  into  our  hands.  He  has  made  us  possessors  of 
his  property  and  requires  of  us  the  faithfulness  of 
stewards. 

D — The  Bible  Also  Teaches  That  Man  Has  Always 

Made  Acknowledgment  of  The  Divine  Ownership 
By  Means  of  a  Separated  Portion 

Read  Genesis  28  :20-22  ;  Leviticus  27  :30-32  ;  Deuter¬ 
onomy  14:22;  Nehemiah  10:37;  Malachi  3:8-10;  Matt. 
23:23-24;  1  Corinthians  16:2;  Deuteronomy  16:17; 
Proverbs  11 :24;  2  Corinthians  8  :l-3  ;  Luke  19  :8  ;  Mark 
12  :41-44.  The  doctrine  of  the  Separated  Portion  is  so 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  19 


important  it  will  be  given  an  entire  study.  (Study  II). 

E — The  Fifth  Statement  Summarizing  The  Bible 

Teachings  on  Stewardship  Is — The  Separated  Por¬ 
tion  Is  Not  Stewardship.  It  Is  Acknowledgment. 

The  giving  of  a  tithe  is  not  stewardship.  Christ¬ 
ian  stewardship  involves  all  we  have  and  are.  After 
the  Separated  Portion  is  set  apart  and  administered, 
stewardship  must  still  control  all  use  of  the  remaining 
portion.  God  retains  ownership  of  all  that  is  left  over 
after  the  Separated  Portion  has  been  set  apart.  The 
Christian  steward  must  use  all  his  possessions  as 
belonging  to  Another.  God  is  as  much  concerned 
about  what  is  left  over  after  our  giving  as  he  is  with 
the  amount  we  give.  (Was  it  the  “widows  mite”  or 
“all  her  living”  that  caught  our  Lord’s  attention?) 
Our  stewardship  has  as  much  to  do  with  our  spending 
and  our  saving  as  with  our  giving.  Perhaps  God 
judges  us  more  by  what  we  do  with  what  we  keep  to 
spend  and  save,  than  by  the  proportion  we  give. 

Do  the  following  statements  fairly  cover  the  princi¬ 
ples  established  in  this  study  of  the  Bible  teaching  on 
man’s  relation  to  his  possessions? 

1.  God  is  the  owner  of  all  things. 

2.  God  has  never  vacated  his  property  rights. 

3.  Man  does  not  own  what  he  possesses  but  is  a 
steward  administering  for  God. 

4.  Man  needs  to  acknowledge  The  divine  owner¬ 
ship  by  setting  aside  for  God  a  definite  portion  or 
income. 

5.  All  that  remains  must  be  also  administered  as  the 
property  of  God. 

Reread  these  statements  one  by  one  and  answer  this 
question: — Do  I  personally  accept  and  am  I  ready  to 
put  into  practice  these  principles  of  Christian  steward¬ 
ship? 


20 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


QUESTIONS  ON  STUDY  I 

DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS? 

1.  What  is  the  fundamental  teaching  of  the  Bible  with 
regard  to  man’s  material  possessions? 

2.  Who  is  the  Owner  of  all  things?  Why  do  you  be¬ 
lieve  this  ?  Memorize  at  least  five  scriptural  passages 
in  support  of  this  statement.  Is  there  any  reason  to 
believe  that  God  ever  gave  up  his  rights  of  owner¬ 
ship  ? 

3.  How  then  did  man  get  strength?  Wisdom?  Oppor¬ 
tunity?  The  ability  to  earn  money? 

4.  If  “Absolute  ownership  is  vested  in  God  only,” 
what  must  we  infer  about  man’s  apparent  ownership 
of  the  earth? 

5.  What  is  God’s  intention  for  man  with  regard  to 
property? 

6.  What  is  the  original  in  the  Greek  for  the  word 
steward?  What  meaning  did  it  carry  originally? 
What  meaning  did  the  Anglo-Saxon  word  “stigweard” 
carry?  Try  to  define  “steward”  in  its  full  scriptural 
meaning.  What  are  the  characteristics  of  a  true  stew¬ 
ard?  What  are  some  differences  between  the  mean¬ 
ing  of  steward  and  trustee? 

7.  Is  the  stewardship  of  money  the  principal  applica¬ 
tion  of  these  Bible  teachings?  What  must  be  our  atti¬ 
tude  toward  time,  personality,  power? 

8.  Show  how  the  French  saying,  “Noblesse  oblige,” 
applies  in  the  case  of  Christian  stewardship. 

9.  Why  is  acknowledgment  of  God’s  ownership  nec¬ 
essary?  What  is  the  relation  between  the  separated 
Portion  and  stewardship  ? 


DO  YOU  OWN  WHAT  YOU  POSSESS  2 1 


10.  State  the  five  principles  established  in  this.  Bible 
study  on  man’s  relation  to  his  possessions. 

11.  “Back  of  the  loaf  is  the  snowy  flour, 

And  back  of  the  flour  the  mill ; 

And  back  of  the  mill  are  the  wheat  and  the  shower 
And  the  sun  and  the  Father’s  will.” 

Is  it  natural  for  you  to  see  God  in  everything  as  Malt- 
bie  D.  Babcock  saw  him  in  his  loaf  of  bread? 


“The  Christian  Religion  is  based  on  an 
act  of  Giving.” 

“God  so  loved  that  He  Gave.” 

Dean  Charles  R.  Brown 


STUDY  II 

THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


E  saw  in  Study  I  that  the  stewardship  of 
material  possessions  constitutes  but  a 
small  part  of  the  stewardship  of  life  as 
a  whole.  The  stewardship  of  money  was 
put  in  its  proper  relation  to  the  larger 
stewardship  of  the  New  Testament.  The  steward¬ 
ship  of  time,  prayer,  personality,  talents,  influence, 
were  discussed  as  vital  parts  of  one’s  full  stewardship. 
It  is  impossible  to  discharge  one’s  stewardship  obliga¬ 
tion  by  tithing  merely  or  by  giving  money  in  any  pro¬ 
portion.  Our  stewardship  includes  all  our  life  as  well 
as  our  possessions.  But  because  material  possessions 
— money — things — what  we  have  to  handle  and  use — 
affect  life  in  such  large  ways,  so  determine  its  tenor, 
that  stewardship  was  defined  in  Study  I  in  terms  of  the 
Christian  attitude  toward  property,  income  and  wealth. 

In  this  second  study  on  the  Separated  Portion  we 
again  for  the  sake  of  brevity  and  clarity  restrict  our 
discussion  to  the  money  phase  of  our  stewardship. 
While  we  keep  chiefly  to  the  money  aspect  of  the 
Separated  Portion  we  must  not  forget  that  stewardship 
deals  with  the  whole  of  life  and  there  must  be  separated 
portions  of  time  and  of  our  personality  in  its  varied  ex¬ 
pression — skill,  grace,  influence  and  of  all  our  other 
possessions.  Whatever  special  ability  we  have  must 
be  looked  upon  as  a  stewardship,  and  portions  of  all 
our  abilities  should  be  used  in  definite  Christian  service 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


23 


as  our  acknowledgment  of  the  divine  ownership  of  our 
lives  and  talents  in  these  various  fields  of  our  lives.  A 
filing  clerk  used  her  special  knowledge  in  keeping  the 
Sunday  School  reports.  An  advertising  expert  used 
his  skill  to  design  church  bill-boards,  programs  and 
copy  for  the  newspapers.  All  our  life  belongs  to  God 
but  He  requires  the  separating  of  a  part  of  everything 
we  possess  as  an  acknowledgment  of  our  stewardship. 
(Mention  and  discuss  other  special  talents  which 
should  be  used  in  some  proportional  part  in  the  work  of 
God’s  kingdom,  such  as  music,  trained  capacity  in 
teaching,  business  executive  ability,  the  power  to  make 
friendships,  political  influence,  etc.)  We  deal  in  this 
study  with  the  Separated  Portion  of  our  money  as  a 
principle  having  a  bearing  upon  our  entire  stewardship 
of  life. 

The  divine  ownership  of  all  things  is  the  fundamental 
word  in  the  stewardship  idea,  as  it  is  also  fundamental 
to  Christian  character  and  the  Christian  social  order.  If 
we  accept  this  basic  idea,  that  what  we  possess  is  not 
our  own  but  is  a  trust  from  God,  then  we  are  face  to 
face  with  the  principle  of  the  Separated  Portion.  The 
doctrine  of  God’s  ownership  of  all  things  is  accom¬ 
panied  both  in  scriptural  teaching  and  in  historical 
practice,  by  the  principle  of  the  Separated  Portion. 
Read : 

Genesis  14:18-20  Matthew  23:23,  24 

Genesis  28 :20-22  Hebrews  7 :4-6,  8,  9 

Leviticus  27 :30-32  1  Cor.  16 :2 

Deuteronomy  14:22,  28,  29  Deuteronomy  16:17 

Nehemiah  10  :37  Proverbs  11 :24 

Proverbs  3:9  II  Cor.  8:1-2 

Malachi  3:8-10  Luke  19:8,9 

Mark  12:41-44 

These  passages  reveal  the  truth  that  God  has  always 
used  the  setting  apart  of  a  definite  proportion  of  the 


24 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


increase — the  first-fruits — The  Separated  Portion  as 
an  acknowledgment  of  his  ownership. 

A.  What  This  Separated  Portion  Is. 

The  Separated  Portion  is  the  acknowledgment  of 
God’s  ownership  of  all.  Just  as  God  separated  one  day 
in  seven  to  remind  us  that  all  time  is  his,  so  from  a 
man’s  possessions  God  requires  that  a  portion  be  sep¬ 
arated  to  remind  man  of  God’s  ownership  of  all  things 
— his  sovereign  dominion  over  us  and  all  things  we 
possess.  There  are  some  who  speak  of  the  Separated 
Portion  as  rent — something  owed  to  God  and  insist 
that  all  the  legalistic  requirements  of  the  law  of  the 
tithe  found  in  the  old  dispensation  are  to  be  brought 
over  into  our  Christian  stewardship.  On  the  other 
hand  there  are  those  who  do  not  want  the  liberty 
wherewith  Christ  hath  made  us  free  to  be  shackled  bv 

j 

any  legalism  of  the  old  covenant.  Those  who  repud¬ 
iate  the  tithe  as  a  binding  debt  often  insist  that  God 
has  made  no  requirements  of  a  separated  portion. 
Men  now  must  give  as  they  are  moved  by  the  Holy 
Ghost  and  not  by  any  rule  of  thumb. 

This  study  of  the  Separated  Portion  takes  a  middle 
way  between  these  two  extremes.  On  the  one  hand 
it  aims  to  safeguard  the  Separated  Portion  from  all 
legalism  and  mere  letter  keeping  of  the  law.  The 
Separated  Portion  is  highly  spiritual — the  acknowledg¬ 
ment  of  God’s  ownership  of  all  our  possession,  just  as 
the  Sabbath  is  the  reminder  of  His  ownership  of  all 
time.  The  amount  of  the  Separated  Portion  may  vary 
in  different  eras  and  for  different  men  under  the  guid¬ 
ance  of  the  Holy  Spirit  just  as  the  method  of  keeping 
the  Sabbath  Day  holy  may  vary.  But  the  principle  of 
the  Separated  Portion  remains  as  the  sign  of  our  ac¬ 
ceptance  of  the  Divine  Ownership. 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


25 


But  on  the  other  hand,  while  we  lift  the  Separated 
Portion  to  the  level  of  our  Christian  liberty  in  Christ, 
removing  it  from  every  contact  with  legalism,  we  do 
not  lose  sigt  of  the  abiding  purpose  of  God  to  secure 
in  the  Separated  Portion  continuing  acknowledgment 
of  his  sovereign  ownership  of  all  things.  The  Sepa¬ 
rated  Portion  was  more  than  an  exhibit  of  men’s 
generosity.  It  was  not  dictated  by  their  spirit  of  gen¬ 
erosity.  It  was  not  benevolence.  It  was  the  sign  and 
symbol  of  their  acceptance  of  the  Divine  Ownership 
and  was  dictated  by  God.  The  spiritualizing  of  the 
tithe  teaching  of  the  Old  Testament  does  not  lessen 
the  significance  of  the  Separated  Portion  for  the 
Christian.  It  intensifies  it.  The  Separated  Portion 
for  the  Christian  becomes  the  sign  of  a  gracious  part¬ 
nership  with  the  Father.  The  tithe  w&s  for  our 
learning.  It  was  to  bring-  us  to  Christ.  However, 
it  still  has.  its  expression  in  the  Separated  Portion. 
This  belonged  to  God  and  no  man  dared  use  it  for 
himself  even  if  he  was  ahungered. 

To  further  emphasize  this  sovereignty  of  God,  the 
Separated  Portion  was  held  to  be  inviolable.  God  did 
not  allow  this  separated  portion — his  portion — to  be 
stored  with  a  man’s  other  possessions.  Leviticus  27 : 
26-34 — holy  to  the  Lord — separated  to  the  Lord ;  Mal- 
achi  8:10,  tithes  are  God’s.  See  Deuteronomy  26:12- 
14.  Reread  I  Corinthians  16:2,  in  the  light  of  this 
discussion.  ' 

The  Separated  Portion  in  itself  has  nothing  to  do 
with  systematic  giving.  We  may  disburse  this  sepa¬ 
rated  portion  by  systematic  giving  but  the  manner  in 
which  the  Separated  Portion  is  administered  is  not  ex¬ 
planatory  of  its  nature.  The  Separated  Portion  is  not 
a  way  to  gather  funds  for  church  support.  When  we 
talk  about  the  Separated  Portion  we  are  not  primarily 


j 


\  I 


26  LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


concerned  with  the  financing  of  the  enterprises  of  the 
Kingdom  of  God.  In  the  setting  apart  of  the  separated 
portion,  we  are  primarily  concerned  with  God’s  honor 
and  glory  and  claim.  The  Separated  Portion  is  our 
acknowledgment  that  what  we  require,  what  we  pos¬ 
sess,  what  we  use  in  the  property  of  Another  and  is 
so  to  be  administered. 

This  has  always  been  done  “Before  the  days  when 
Jesus  Christ  spoke  the  parable  of  the  Householder  who 
planted  a  vineyard  and  let  it  out  to  husbandmen,  from 
the  earliest  history  of  the  race  until  today,  men  have 
been  accustomed  to  render  some  proportion,  whether 
of  oil,  or  corn,  or  some  other  measure  of  value,  as  an 
acknowledgment  that  they  were  occupying  and  using 
property  that  was  owned  by  another.  This,  the  owner 
has  required  of  them,  not  primarily  that  he  might  re¬ 
ceive  a  profit — though  this  is  his  just  and  honorable 
right — but  that  his  own  title  to  and  control  of  the  prop¬ 
erty  might  be  held  in  constant  remembrance.  Without 
a  stated  acknowledgment  of  dependence,  property  pos¬ 
session  unconsciously  erects  itself  into  practical  if  not 
avowed  ownership.  ‘Owners’  will  accept,  if  need  be,  a 
lesser  rate,  but  they  absolutely  demand  acknowledg¬ 
ment — in  some  amount — even  if  it  be  nothing  more 
than  the  nominal  ‘one  dollar  a  year  and  consideration.’ 
Acknowledgment  must  be  rendered  because  ‘owner¬ 
ship’  must  be  maintained.”  (The  Stewardship  of 
Property — H.  R.  Calkins.)  “Long  before  the  Mosaic 
Law  was  formulated  the  tithe  (one-tenth)  had  been 
recognized  as  an  obligation  of  universal  application 
for  the  support  of  religion.  The  spade  of  the  archaeol¬ 
ogist  keeps  adding  to  the  proofs  that  the  law  of  the 
tithe  was  in  earliest  times  applied  in  Babylonia  and 
Egypt  while  hoary  records  of  India  and  China  attest 
the  same  to  have  been  the  practice  in  those  lands  as 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


27 


well.  So  Abram  'gave  a  tenth  of  all  to  Melchizedek, 
King  of  Salem — priest  of  God  most  high’  and  Jacob  fol¬ 
lowed  in  the  steps  of  his  grandfather  in  devoting  a 
tenth  to  God’s  service.”  (Your  Own  or  Another’s, 
David  McConaughy)  Tithing  was  practiced  by  the 
nations  of  antiquity  that  knew  nothing  about  the  law  of 
Moses.  We  find  without  exception  they  paid  tithes  to 
their  heathen  gods. 

"Instances  are  mentioned  in  history,  of  some  nations 
who  did  not  offer  sacrifices,  but  in  the  annals  of  all  time 
none  are  found  who  did  not  pay  tithes.  Why  did 
Abraham  and  Jacob,  who  lived  many  centuries  before 
the  law  of  Moses  was  given,  pay  tithes?  And  why  did 
these  nations  of  antiquity  who  knew  nothing  about 
God’s  holy  law  pay  tithes  to  their  false  gods?  Away 
back  in  the  beginning  of  man’s  sojourn  here  upon  this 
earth,  God  must  have  given  him  the  law  of  the  tithe. 
Tithing  no  more  had  its  beginning  at  Mt.  Sinai  than  did 
the  Sabbath.  The  Sabbath  did  not  originate  with  the 
giving  of  the  law.  The  fourth  commandment  reads, 
"Remember  the  Sabbath  Day  to  keep  it  holy.”  A 
Sabbath  has  been  observed  by  God’s  people  from  the 
creation  of  man.  So  we  find  that  the  idea  of  the  tithe 
did  not  originate  with  the  law  of  Moses.  It  had  been 
practiced  centuries  before  Moses  was  born.”  (Should 
Christians  Tithe? — Oscar  Lowry). 

The  historian  Grotius  says  that  from  the  most 
ancient  ages  a  tenth  has  been  regarded  as  the  portion 
due  to  God  and  that  the  evidence  of  this  fact  is  to  be 
found  in  both  Greek  and  Latin  histories.  Pliny  says 
that  the  Ethiopians  paid  tithes  of  cinnamon  to  their 
gods  and  it  was  unlawful  for  their  merchants  to  buy  or 
sell  any  of  their  goods  until  their  priests  had  taken  out 
the  tenth  for  their  gods.  The  Pelasgi,  being  punished 
with  a  barren  year  for  the  neglect  of  this  duty,  removed 


28 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


the  judgment  by  vowing  the  tenth  of  their  profits  to 
the  gods.  Lucullus,  the  richest  Roman  in  history,  tak¬ 
ing  account  of  his  large  estate,  vowed  all  the  tithes  to 
the  gods.  “Now  since  this  proportion  of  one  in  ten,” 
says  Collyer,  “is  certainly  indifferent  in  itself,  as  one  in 
seven  or  one  in  eight,  it  is  reasonable  to  suppose  that 
the  custom  of  paying  tithes,  so  general  among  different 
and  distant  nations,  must  have  had  some  divine  direc¬ 
tion  for  it,  and  that  it  was  derived  from  Adam  to  Noah 
and  from  him  to  his  posterity  until  by  the  dispersion  of 
Babel  it  spread  all  over  the  world.”  This  universal 
custom  and  scriptural  testimony  should  be  evidence 
conclusive  that  this  acknowledgment  of  God’s  owner¬ 
ship  has  abiding  spiritual  value  and  must  constitute 
a  part  of  every  normal  Christian  life. 

B.  Why  This  Separated  Portion 

Some  will  say  “If  God  owns  all,  why  specially  sepa¬ 
rate  a  definite  portion  of  our  money,  to  be  known  as 
God’s  portion.  Why  not  say,  it  all  belongs  to  God. 
and  let  it  go  at  that?  Why  did  God  require  a  portion  to 
be  set  aside?”  Undoubtedly  part  of  the  reason  is  found 
in  the  natural  tendency  of  human  nature  to  confuse 
dominion  with  ownership.  Being  made  in  the  image  of 
God,  able  to  think  of  and  feel  our  inherent  dignity  and 
power,  it  is  natural  to  glory  in  our  possessions  and  for¬ 
get  God.  The  human  mind  works  that  way  and  cannot 
help  it.  Our  kinship  with  God  carries  with  it  the  con¬ 
sciousness  of  creative  power,  the  capacity  to  exercise 
dominion.  God  implanted  in  man  the  instinct  to  own 
and  to  exercise  dominion.  In  the  beginning  he  said  to 
the  man  he  had  made  “Have  dominion!”  (Genesis 
2:28).  Our  natural,  God-endowed  disposition  to  exer¬ 
cise  dominion,  tempts  us  to  independent  exercise  of 
this  privilege  and  we  constantly  need  a  very  definite  re- 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


29 


minder  of  God’s  absolute  dominion.  God  has  given  us 
dominion  within  the  range  of  his  own  eternal  rights. 
The  Separated  Portion  lifts  the  mind  and  heart  to  the 
Owner  of  all,  and  reminds  us  that  we  and  all  that  we 
have  are  his,  protecting  us  from 

(1)  Inflated  pride  (Daniel  4:20-27) 

(2)  Covetousness  (Malachi  3:8-10) 

(3)  Unspiritual  worship  (Nehemiah  10) 

(4)  Forgetting  God  (Deuteronomy  8:17,  18) 

Can  you  name  other  evils  growing  out  of  the  failure 
to  acknowledge  the  absolute  sovereignty  of  God  ?  How 
possession  without  recognition  of  the  divine  ownership 
tends  to  inflate  human  pride  and  leads  to  covetousness 
is  well  told  by  David  Grayson  in  “Adventures  in  Con¬ 
tentment.”  He  came  to  own  his  farm.  Speaking  of 
his  emotions  of  possession,  he  says,  “I  had  come  here  to 
be  free,  and  already  this  farm,  which  I  thought  of  so 
fondly  as  my  possession,  was  coming  to  possess  me. 
Ownership  is  an  appetite  like  hunger  or  thirst,  and  as 
we  may  eat  to  gluttony  and  drink  to  drunkenness,  so 
we  may  possess  to  avarice.  How  many  men  have  I 
seen  who,  though  they  regard  themselves  as  models  of 
temperance,  wear  the  marks  of  unbridled  indulgence  of 
the  passion  of  possession  and  how,  like  gluttony  and 
licentiousness,  it  sets  its  sure  sign  on  their  faces.” 
Grayson  goes  on  to  tell  how  be  began  to  covet  his 
neighbor’s  fields  and  how  he  began  to  hate  the  man 
next  door  who  always  had  been  his  friend  because  he 
wanted  his  field.  Then  he  thought  what  this  human 
passion  for  possession  was  doing  for  man  everywhere. 

He  says  “In  each  small  enclosure  (field,  property) 
stood  a  man  as  hot  as  I  with  the  passion  of  possession. 
How  they  all  envied  and  hated,  in  their  longing  for 
more  land  !  How  property  kept  them  apart,  prevented 
the  close  confident  touch  of  friendship,  how  it  separated 


30 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


lovers  and  ruined  families !  Of  all  obstacles  to  that 
complete  democracy  of  which  we  dream,  is  there 
greater  than  property?”  How  can  a  truly  Christian 
order  of  society  be  built  while  the  fences  of  private 
ownership  are  up?  The  principles  of  Christian  stew¬ 
ardship  must  come  in  here.  “God  is  the  owner”  and 
lest  we  forget,  we  are  constantly  to  set  aside  a  definite 
portion  which  shall  be  God’s  and  cannot  be  used  for 
self.  This  Separated  Portion  makes  us  remember  God. 
It  is  vastly  more  than  a  means  of  financing  the  work  of 
the  church  or  the  interests  of  the  Kingdom.  It  is  God’s 
established  reminder  “Lest  we  forget”  his  ownership, 
our  stewardship  and  responsibility. 

The  Separated  Portion  makes  us  immediately  aware 
of  God.  The  eternal  Presence  is  found  in  things.  It 
puts  God  into  the  very  midst  of  life,  where  men  spend 
the  most  of  their  time  and  strength  and  thought.  No¬ 
tice  carefully  that  it  is  not  the  Separated  Portion  by 
itself  that  challenges  attention.  The  Separated  Por¬ 
tion  declares  that  man  counts  all  his  possessions  as  be¬ 
longing  to  God  and  to  be  administered  for  Him.  By  it, 
the  man  is  established  in  Stewardship,  administering 
for  God  everything  he  has,  as  well  as  what  he  is.  The 
Separated  Portion  is  not  the  man’s  stewardship  but  is 
the  acknowledgment  of  it.  Stewardship  is  recognition 
of  God’s  ownership  of  all  and  the  administration  of  all 
for  Him.  As  one  man  put  it — “I  was  a  Christian  man. 
I  never  doubted  the  fact  of  God  nor  the  truth  of  His 
revelation.  I  think  it  is  fair  to  say  that  I  lived  a  con¬ 
sistent  Christian  life  and  helped  my  fellow  men.  But 
it  was  not  until  I  recognized  God  to  be  the  actual  owner 
of  the  property  which  I  held  that  I  understood  the  thrill 
of  fellowship  with  God.  When  I  paid  my  tithe,  in  ac¬ 
knowledgment  of  that  ownership,  it  seemed  as  though 
every  atom  of  my  being  acknowledged  Him.  I  knew 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


31 


that  God  owned  not  only  the  property  which  I  pos¬ 
sessed,  but  myself  as  well.  From  that  day  to  this,  fel¬ 
lowship  with  God  has  been  natural  and  easy.” 

The  Separated  Portion  is  the  sign  of  a  personal  fel¬ 
lowship  with  God.  It  introduces  a  man  into  the  abun¬ 
dant  life  of  a  spiritual  partnership  with  the  Eternal. 

C.  How  Much  Is  This  Separated  Portion? 

Remembering  now  that  the  separated  portion  is  not 
the  expression  of  one’s  stewardship  but  the  acknowl¬ 
edgment  of  it,  we  turn  to  ask  how  much  shall  the 
separated  portion  be?  What  ratio  shall  it  bear  to  the 
rest  of  one’s  possessions?  Several  things  need  to  be 
remembered  : 

I.  The  Christian  Steward  must  not  be  brought  into 
bondage  to  any  merely  legal  requirements.  The  basis 
of  authority  for  any  obedience  for  the  Christian  stew¬ 
ard  must  be  the  Spirit  and  not  the  letter.  The  Christ¬ 
ian  cannot  be  “subject”  to  ordinances.  (Gal.  2:20). 
“We  are  no  longer  under  a  school-master”  (the  law)  ; 
we  “are  all-the  children  of  God  by  faith  in  Christ  Jesus.” 
(Gal.  3:24-26). 

II.  Secular,  as  well  as  Biblical  history,  records  the 
early  and  widespread  use  of  the  tithe,  one  tenth,  as  the 
amount  of  the  Separated  Portion.  This  amount  and  its 
definite  practice  from  the  beginning  undoubtedly  had 
the  divine  sanction.  The  Christian  steward  will  desire 
to  set  aside  at  least  as  much  as  the  tithe  unless  he  is 
assured  that  God  has  set  another  ratio  for  him.  Many 
Christian  stewards  have  found  the  tithe  a  convenient 
starting  point.  The  tenth  has  the  impressiveness  of 
an  ancient  practice,  but  it  must  not  be  urged  as  the  final 
and  adequate  measure  for  the  dispensation  of  the  Spirit. 
As  Bishop  Quayle  says,  “The  tithe  is  a  good  place  to 
start.  It  is  no  place  to  stop.” 


32 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


III.  There  is  a  well-nigh  hopeless  confusion  as  to 
the  sanction  of  the  tithe.  Is  it  still  binding  as  a  God- 
fixed  ratio  for  the  church  today?  Some  say  it  is  a  uni¬ 
versal  obligation.  “The  tithe  is  one  of  God’s  twin  laws, 
eternal,  immutable,  unchangeable  as  the  Sabbath  itself 
— one  tenth  of  man’s  money,  as  well  as  one  seventh  of 
man’s  time,  is  God’s  in  a  peculiar  sense.  Both  of  these 
laws  are  as  old  as  the  race,  for  man’s  benefit ;  reaffirmed, 
(not  enacted)  in  the  Mosaic  Law;  endorsed  by  Jesus; 
taught  by  the  apostles  and  observed  for  centuries  in  the 
Christian  Church.”  Another  says,  “Not  so!  Tithing 
is  legalistic.  I  lay  down  no  proportion  of  tenths,  thirds 
or  halves ;  for  Christ  has  not  done  so.  Under  the  Levi- 
tical  law  everything  was  demanded  by  weight,  number 
and  measure.  But  it  is  not  so  under  the  more  free  and 
generous  and  spiritual  dispensation  of  the  gospel. 
Christ  has  trusted  his  cause  to  our  love,  our  honor,  our 
sense  of  gratitude.  Under  the  legal  dispensation,  all 
things  taken  into  account,  a  Jew’s  religion  would  have 
cost  him  little  less  than  half  of  his  income.  And  yet 
some  Christians  talk  of  a  tenth  of  theirs.  I  do  not  say 
how  much  is  enough  for  poorer  Christians,  but  I  am 
sure  that  for  rich  ones  this  is  a  very  paltry  sum  to 
carry  to  Him  who  gave  all  for  them.” 

IV.  It  would  be  expected  that  the  Spirit  in  the  new 
dispensation,  guiding  in  the  determination  of  the  ratio 
of  the  Separated  Portion,  would  lift  it  to  a  more  exact¬ 
ing  level  than  had  been  attained  in  the  old  dispensation 
under  the  law,  but  will  not  be  less  than  one  tenth. 
The  Christian  steward’s  Separated  Portion  will  go  far 
beyond  the  mere  letter  of  the  law,  and  this  is  exactly 
what  happens. 

(a)  II  Cor.  9:6,  7.  “But  this  I  say,  he  which  soweth 
sparingly  shall  reap  also  sparingly ;  and  he  which 
soweth  bountifully  shall  reap  also  bountifully.  Every 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


33 


man  accordingly  as  he  purposeth  in  his  heart,  so  let  him 
give;  not  grudgingly,  or  of  necessity;  for  God  loveth  a 
cheerful  giver.” 

(b)  I  Cor.  16 :1,  2.  “Now  concerning  the  collec¬ 
tion  for  the  saints,  as  I  have  given  order  to  the  churches 
of  Galatia,  even  so  do  ye.  Upon  the  first  day  of  the 
week,  let  everyone  of  you  lay  by  him  in  store,  as  God 
hath  prospered  him,  that  there  be  no  gatherings  when 

I  come.” 

(c)  Luke  19  :8.  “The  half  of  my  goods  I  give  to  the 
poor.”  “If  I  have  wrongfully  exacted  aught  of  any 
man,  I  restore  fourfold.” 

(d)  •  Mark  12  :44.  “The  widow”— “All  her  living.” 

V.  The  New  Testament  Steward  will  be  constantlv 
increasing  the  amount  of  God’s  portion,  gratefully  giv¬ 
ing  away  a  larger  part  of  his  increasing  income  year 
after  year.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  not  the  amount 
given  away  counts  with  God,  but  the  amount  retained 
for  other  causes  that  counts — “They  all  did  cast  in  their 
superfluity”  ;  “All  her  living.” 

It  is  not  the  deed  that  we  do 
Tho  the  deed  be  never  so  fair, 

But  the  love  that  the  dear  Lord  looketh  for, 

Hidden  with  lovely  care, 

In  the  heart  of  the  deed  so  fair. 

Yes,  love  is  the  priceless  thing; 

The  treasure,  our  treasure  must  hold 
Or  ever  the  Master  receive  the  gift 
Or  tell  the  weight  of  the  gold 
By  the  love  which  cannot  be  told. 

God  sets  no  premium  on  asceticism  per  se,  and  is  glad 
to  have  his  children  use  for  their  own  happiness  and 
comfort  and  effectiveness  his  good  gifts.  He  does  not 


34 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


always  demand  that  they  give  all  their  living  away. 
However,  he  is  not  concerned  to  have  his  children 
share  his  own  spirit  of  solicitude  for  a  world  of  need, 
and  want  to  give  as  he  gave,  even  to  real  self-sacrifice. 
So  that  Christian  stewards  in  any  complete  understand¬ 
ing  of  their  stewardship  will  feel  that  many  of  the  items 
of  expenditure  for  self  should  be  curtailed  or  wholly 
decapitated,  in  order  to  provide  additional  sums  for 
glad  use  in  gifts  to  the  kingdom  enterprise. 

That  is  to  say,  for  the  Christian  steward,  -Spending 
will  not  determine  Giving.  The  Christian  steward 
will  not  buy  everything  and  anything  he  wants  or 
thinks  he  needs  and  then  if  there  is  anything  left 
plan  to  give  some  away.  But  Giving  will  determine 
Spending.  The  Christian  steward  with  the  mind  of 
Christ  first  gives  and  then  spends  on  the  basis  of  what 
remains. 

D.  How  Administer  the  Separated  Portion? 

Reminding  ourselves  again  that  the  Separated  Por¬ 
tion  is  not  the  expression  nor  the  measure  of  our  stew¬ 
ardship,  but  its  acknowledgment,  we  may  say  one  or 
two  things  about  the  administration  of  the  Separated 
Portion. 

Let  us  repeat,  the  Separated  Portion  is  not  set  apart 
in  order  that  the  Kingdom  of  God  may  be  financed. 
The  Kingdom  of  God  can  come  into  the  political,  social 
and  industrial  life  of  men  only  when  the  ideals  of 
Christian  Stewardship  become  the  law  in  all  life.  The 
giving  of  portions  of  our  time,  our  strength,  our 
thought,  to  the  Kingdom,  will  never  bring  that  King¬ 
dom  in.  Even  if  the  whole  world  tithed,  that  would 
not  bring  in  the  kingdom.  The  kingdom  waits  for  the 
practice  of  the  stewardship  of  life  as  a  whole.  The 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


35 


process  of  acquiring,  -  holding,  spending,  saving,  as 
well  as  the  giving  of  money,  must  be  Christianized  be¬ 
fore  the  kingdom  can  come.  While  the  Separated  Por¬ 
tion  is  not  primarily  set  aside  in  order  to  finance  the 
Kingdom  of  God,  the  Christian  steward  is  privileged  to 
administer  this  Separated  Portion  for  the  Kingdom  in¬ 
terests — Church — philanthropies — and  human  service. 
If  the  Separated  Portion  should  be  estimated  on  the 
basis  of  the  tithe  by  all  Christians,  the  amounts  thus 
made  available  would  fully  finance  the  entire  necessary 
programs  of  church  and  charity.  The  proper  adminis¬ 
tration  of  “God’s  portion”  would  make  possible  the  pro¬ 
jection  of  the  comprehensive  missionary  and  religious 
education  program  needed  at  this  hour  of  world  recon¬ 
struction.  It  is  in  the  administration  of  the  Separated 
Portion  that  “Systematic  Giving”  finds  its  place.  God 
requires  the  Separated  Portion  to  be  administered  for 
the  Kingdom,  in  business-like  ways. 

The  question  of  the  share  of  the  Separated  Portion 
which  the  church  should  receive  must  be  raised  here. 
The  Christian  Steward  will  be  careful  to  remember  that 
the  Christian  Church  performs  a  function  so  distinctive 
and  so  necessary  that  it  should  have  the  full  support  of 
those  who  believe  in  its  mission.  Other  institutions 
and  movements  and  charities  will  have  the  considera¬ 
tion  and  support  of  the  people  who  are  not  believers  in 
the  church  and,  who  will  support  them  but  will  not 
give  anything  to  the  church.  While  the  Christian 
Steward  will  be  cosmopolitan  in  his  sympathy  and 
concern,  and  will  desire  to  share  in  every  good  enter¬ 
prise,  he  will  first  of  all  see  that  the  distinctive  and 
basic  activities  of  the  Christian  Church  are  main¬ 
tained  at  an  effective  level  by  adequately  financing 
them.  Too  often  the  division  of  the  gifts  by  Chris¬ 
tians  and  by  churches  is  made  without  due  regard  to 


36 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


needs  of  the  spiritual  enterprise  as  carried  on  by  the 
church.  They  give  to  outside  causes,  for  various 
reasons,  so  generously  that  the  full  financing  of  the  spe¬ 
cific  task  for  which  they  are  particularly  responsible 
is  impeded.  On  one  Sunday  one  church  recently  in 
answer  to  a  stirring  appeal  for  a  most  worthy  cause 
gave  over  $1,800.  For  the  whole  year  that  same  con¬ 
gregation  gave  the  missionary  Boards  and  Agencies 
only  $1,895.  Dr.  Jowett  says:  “Conscience  in  the 
matter  of  giving  is  apt  to  become  less  sensitive  as  the 
appeals  come  from  the  necessities  of  the  soul.  Many 
a  man  will  give  generously  in  response  to  a  cry  of 
material  hunger  who  is  numb  to  a  cry  of  spiritual 
hunger.  Many  men  will  give  a  large  contribution  to 
relieve  the  hungry  children  in  eastern  Europe  who  feel 
no  urgency  in  the  cry  of  those  who  are  spiritually 
hungry  in  Mongolia  or  Thibet.  They  would  hasten 
to  succor  a  fainting  body,  but  they  are  careless  to  the 
needs  of  a  fainting  heart. ”  Would  it  be  fair  to  sug¬ 
gest  that  Christian  people  divide  all  their  benevolen¬ 
ces  between  the  church  and  outside  causes  in  the 
ratio  of  two-thirds  to  the  church  (both  local  support 
and  missions)  and  one-third  to  the  outside  causes. 

It  has  been  estimated  that  only  about  55.6  per  cent, 
of  the  church  members  subscribe  regularly  to  Current 
Expenses  and  only  33.6  per  cent,  of  the  church  members 
give  regularly  to  Benevolences.  The  practice  should 
be,  every  member,  every  week,  giving  proportionately 
to  both  Current  Expenses  and  to  Benevolences.  How 
shall  a  steward  divide  between  the  local  church  and 
the  world-wide  work  of  his  church?  In  the  division  of 
our  gifts,  we  need  to  keep  in  mind  the  world  program 
of  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord,  the  great  Head  of  the  Church. 
Many  churches  spend  from  90  to  100  per  cent,  of  their 
income  on  the  local  field.  The  “Golden  Rule”  method 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


37 


of  dividing  expenditures  is  being  practiced  by  a  grow¬ 
ing  number  of  churches — “as  much  for  others  as  for 
ourselves.”  This  means  that  the  leaders  of  the  church 
and  its  members  agree  to  divide  their  church  subscrip¬ 
tions  so  that  benevolences  shall  not  be  less  than  the 


congregation  expenses.  How  nearly  does  your  church 
approximate  this  “Golden  Rule”  ratio? 


THE  FIRST  TITHER  IN  THIS  CHURCH  How  do  VOU 

APART  FROM  THE  PASTOR  WAS  A  YOUNG  MAN  , .  .  ,  J 

He  Wh  C.n.aM.d  by  dlV'de  y°Ur  P^ 

A  Banker  and  A  Retired  Fanner  SOnal  SUbSCTip- 

They  Were  So  Amazed  at  the  Amount  He  Subscribed  That  ,  •  ■)  a 

They  Went  Back  and  Asked  If  He  Had  Made  A  Mistake  t IOIIS  .  I V T e  yOU 

HE  SUBSCRIBED  MORE  THAN  THE  TWO  MEN  TOGETHER  sharing  the  World 

vision  of  your 
Lord  in  the  a- 
mount  and  meth¬ 
od  of  your  sub¬ 
scriptions  for  the 
world  work  of 
his  kingdom? 
The  only  ade¬ 
quate  :basis  for 
the  distribution  of  his  Separated  Portion  is  “Where 

will  this  money  accomplish  the  most  for  the  glory  of 
God  through  the  up-building  of  his  kingdom?  This 
requires  that  all  conscientious  stewards  become  wide¬ 
ly  informed  of  kingdom  movements.  They  should 
read  extensively  the  literature  of  their  own  church 
giving  the  account  of  the  various  phases  of  work  and 


need.  The  first  call  to  the  Christian  steward  will  be 


his  own  church  both  local  and  at  large.  This  should 
first  be  met,  and  not  till  after  this  is  adequately  cared 
for  should  “special  contributions”  be  in  order. 


38 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


E.  What  About  The  Use  of  The  Remaining  Portion 

of  Our  Possessions? 

Stewardship  is  not  merely  giving  a  portioh  to  God 
but  it  is  the  administration  of  all  for  God.  There  may 
be  a  faithful  stewardship  of  income  or  property  without 
tithing  and  there  may  be  a  conscientious  laying  aside 
of  one-tenth  of  one’s  income  for  the  Lord’s  work  with¬ 
out  a  deep  sense  of  one’s  relation  to  God  as  his  steward. 
Faithful  stewardship  manifests  itself  not  only  in  the 
setting  apart  of  the  separated  portion  but  in  the  rever¬ 
ent  recognition  that  all  the  rest  of  one’s  possessions  is 
a  field  for  stewardship.  In  the  discussion  of  the  duty 
of  privilege  of  Christian  stewards,  we  find  that  oppor¬ 
tunity  for  service  appears  in  every  area  of  life  and  of 
one’s  possessions.  We  can  serve  God  not  only  in  and 
through  the  separated  portion  but  in  all  the  remainder 
of  our  possessions.  This  remainder  must  be  so  man¬ 
aged  and  expended  as  to  help  discharge  our  steward¬ 
ship  of  self-development  and  life.  We  must  provide 
habitation,  education  and  recreation  needed  properly 
to  develop  the  physical,  mental  and  moral  life  of  our¬ 
selves  and  our  families.  If  we  recognize  our  steward¬ 
ship  here,  it  will  appear  at  once  that  we  are  not  out  to 
‘'make  a  living”  but  to  "build  a  life”  in  right  relation 
and  in  fellowship  with  God.  All  things  needed  will 
come  from  the  Father.  (Matthew  6:25-34).  The 
steward  viewing  all  of  his  possessions  from  this  angle 
will  be  safeguarded  against  foolishness  in  wasteful 
luxuries  and  the  illegitimate  expenditure  incident  to 
merely  keeping  up  with  the  times.  He  will  remember 
that  Paul  enjoined  us  "having  food  and  raiment,  let  us 
be  therewith  content.”  (I  Timothy  6:8).  "When  the 
priest  was  consecrated,  the  blood  of  the  ram  was  put 
upon  the  right  ear,  the  thumb  of  the  right  hand  and 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


39 


the  great  toe  of  the  right  foot  to  indicate  that  he  should 
come  and  go,  use  his  hand  and  powers  of  mind,  in 
short  his  entire  self,  in  the  service  of  God.  These 
parts  of  the  body  were  selected  as  representative  of  the 
whole  man.  The  tithe  was  also  representative.” 
(“Our  Country.”  Josiah  Strong).  “For  if  the  first 
fruit  (the  separated  portion)  be  holy,  the  lump  is  also 
holy.”  (Romans  11:16).  It  is  written,  “The  tithe  is 
the  Lord’s.”  It  is  also  written  “The  earth  is  the 
Lord’s  and  the  fullness  thereof.” 

Stewardship  of  the  leftover  portion  involves  also  the 
duty  of  systematic  and  legitimate  saving.  The  amount 
to  be  saved  and  the  method  of  saving  must  both  be 
divorced  from  all  merely  selfish  considerations.  The 
savings  of  the  Christian  steward  will  always  have  a 
bearing  on  the  progress  of  God’s  kingdom.  In  so  far 
as  the  accumulations  of  the  steward’s  savings  will  tend 
to  provide  a  fuller  life  of  Christian  service  for  his  chil¬ 
dren  and  his  heirs,  they  are  in  accord  with  steward¬ 
ship  principles.  But  savings  accumulated  to  provide 
luxuries  or  a  period  of  non-productive  leisure  or  to 
furnish  the  children  and  heirs  with  means  to  live  apart 
from  the  honest  administration  of  their  lives  in  the 
stewardship  of  service  are  certain  to  be  in  the  future,  as 
they  have  been,  almost  universally  in  the  past,  a  blight 
— robbing  many  lives  of  conscious  fellowship  with  God 
in  the  discharge  of  the  duties  and  privileges  of  Christ¬ 
ian  stewardship.  (Matthew  6:19;  Proverbs  11:24; 
Psalms  40:8).  What  is  your  attitude  toward  legacies? 
Should  a  Christian  man  leave  his  possessions  to  his 
children?  Should  he  leave  unlimited  amounts? 

It  is  difficult  in  a  short  study  to  set  forth  in  any  com¬ 
plete  way  the  broadening  and  enriched  life  which  de¬ 
velops  under  the  stewardship  ideal.  God  calls  us  to 
be  stewards  not  to  shut  us  off  from  owning  and  using 


40 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


things  as  we  please ;  (it  had  to  be  however,  that  he 
should  enforce  his  sovereignty)  but  God  calls  us  to  be 
stewards  in  order  to  give  us  the  intimacy  of  a  real  fel¬ 
lowship  with  him  as  partner  and  co-worker.  “It  is 
when  a  man  works  with  God  that  he  is  initiated  or  in¬ 
troduced  into  a  deeper  and  more  sympathetic  know¬ 
ledge  of  the  mind  of  God.  The  Master  Workman  re¬ 
veals  his  glorious  truth  and  grace  to  his  obedient  work¬ 
man.  God  takes  him  into  his  fuller  confidence  and  they 
two  work  together  hand  in  hand  with  complete  under¬ 
standing  and  sympathy.” 

F.  Stewardship  in  Acquisition 

The  student  will  have  noticed  that  up  to  the  present, 
our  treatment  of  stewardship  has  been  in  terms  of  the 
use  of  our  possessions.  The  discussion  of  the  steward¬ 
ship  of  the  acquisition  of  our  possessions  will  be  taken 
up  at  length  in  Study  V. 

Let  us  recall  the  outstanding  teachings  of  this  study  : 

(1)  The  Separated  Portion  Is  An  Acknowledgment 
Of  God’s  Ownership  and  Our  Stewardship.  It  is  not 

intended  primarily  as  a  means  of  financing  the  king¬ 
dom.  It  is  a  reminder  that  God  owns  all  we  are  and 
have. 

(2)  The  Disbursement  Of  This  Separated  Portion  Is 
Not  An  Expression  Of  Our  Generosity.  It  is  a  priv¬ 
ilege  given  us  of  God  to  apportion  what  is  God’s  to  the 
interests  of  the  kingdom. 

(3)  The  Amount  Of  The  Separated  Portion  Is  Not 
Determined  By  God  For  The  Christian.  It  is  hard  to 

believe  the  Christian  steward’s  separated  portion  will 
ever  be  less  than  the  amount  set  for  the  Jew — one  tenth. 
The  New  Testament  everywhere  intimates  it  should  be 
more. 


THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 


41 


(4)  The  Separated  Portion  Does  Not  Relieve  Us 
From  The  Privilege  And  Duty  Of  Stewardship  Admin¬ 
istration  Of  All  The  Remainder  Of  Our  Possessions. 

The  separated  portion  rather  enforces  our  accountabil¬ 
ity  for  all  that  remains. 

Are  you  prepared  to  determine  under  God’s  guidance 
the  percentage  of  your  separated  portion?  Have  you 
been  acknowledging  your  stewardship  by  proportionate 
giving?  What  ratio  do  you  use?  If  you  have  never 
set  apart  the  separated  portion,  will  you  do  it  now? 

Will  these  principles  of  Christian  Stewardship  make 
you  more  thoughtful  and  more  Christian  in 

Your  expenditures  for  clothes?  Amusements? 
Luxuries  ? 

Your  saving  plan? 

Your  use  of  your  time  ?  (Have  you  ever  determined 
upon  a  “separated  portion”  of  time?) 

Your  use  of  your  personality,  your  special  gifts  and 
education  ? 

If  you  were  called  upon  today  to  render  an  account¬ 
ing  of  your  stewardship,  would  you  be  found  a  good 
and  faithful  steward? 

QUESTIONS  ON  STUDY  II 

THE  SEPARATED  PORTION 

1 .  Is  the  Stewardship  of  material  possessions  the  most 
important  part  of  our  stewardship?  Why  do  material 
possessions  afford  the  best  basis  on  which  to  discuss 
stewardship? 

2.  What  is  the  Separated  Portion?  Carefully  distin¬ 
guish  it  from  systematic  giving.  Is  it  dictated  by  our 
spirit  of  generosity?  If  not,  by  what? 


42 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


3.  What  happens  if  the  Separated  Portion,  the  ac¬ 
knowledgment  of  God’s  ownership,  is  neglected? 

4.  Tell  David  Grayson’s  thought  about  the  harm  of 
avarice  and  love  of  property.  How  is  stewardship 
going  to  lessen  this  harm? 

5.  What  does  the  practice  of  the  Separated  Portion 
help  us  to  remember? 

6.  How  old  does  history  show  the  tithe  idea  to  be? 
Tell  some  of  the  early  ideas  about  the  tithe. 

7.  How  much  do  you  think  the  Separated  Portion 
should  be?  What  was  Bishop  Quayle’s  word  on  the 
subject?  What  have  others  said? 

8.  Once  having  determined  this  ratio  for  ourselves, 
must  we  stick  to  it  rigidly? 

9.  How  much  may  Christian  Stewards  have  for  them¬ 
selves?  How  will  they  spend  what  remains  after  the 
deduction  of  the  Separated  Portion? 

10.  What  shall  be  done  with  the  Separated  Portion? 
Should  all  be  given  to  the  church  ?  What  consideration 
is  the  church  entitled  to,  in  the  Christian  individual’s 
plan  of  giving? 

11.  How  should  the  remaining  amount  be  adminis¬ 
tered? 

12.  For  what  purpose  do  you  think  saving  is  justi¬ 
fiable? 

13.  What  will  be  the  result,  spiritually  speaking,  of 
practicing  Stewardship? 


“Here  in  the  paths  of  every  day — 

Is  all  the  holy  God  would  take 
To  build  a  heaven,  to  mould  and  make 
New  Edens.  Ours  the  task  sublime 
To  build  eternity  in  time.” 


STUDY  III 

BUDGET  MAKING 

O  soon  as  the  Christian  grasps  the  far- 
reaching  significance  of  those  principles 
of  Christian  stewardship — God’s  owner¬ 
ship — his  accountability  as  steward  of 
the  things  he  handles — the  required 
separated  portion,  (the  first  fruits) — he  realizes  the 
need  of  definiteness,  exactness  of  accounting,  system, 
proportioning.  The  worker  with  God  who  studies 
“to  show  himself  approved  unto  God  thoroughly  fur¬ 
nished  unto  every  good  work.”  (2  Timothy  2:15;  3  : 17) 
will  need  to  examine  with  understanding  and  in  detail 
the  where  and  the  how  of  his  stewardship  obligations. 
His  desire  to  make  the  most  of  his  stewardship  will 
require  him  to  organize  his  life — to  know  how  his 
time  and  his  possessions  are  being  spent.  He  will  want 
to  know  how  much  he  has  and  how  best  to  use  it. 

A.  Keeping  Books  With  God. 

The  worker  with  God  will  find  it  necessary  for  sat¬ 
isfactory  efficiency  to  thoroughly  systematize  his  activ¬ 
ities.  God  does  not  work  by  haphazard  methods ; 
neither  may  a  worker  with  God. 

Too  much  of  our  life  is  executed  at  random.  We  let 
our  strength,  our  time,  our  interest,  our  prayers,  our 
money  go  by  sheer  happen-chance.  We  have  no  plan, 


44 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


no  goal,  no  program.  We  do  the  next  thing  whether 
or  not  it  be  related  to  the  whole  for  which  we  are  re¬ 
sponsible.  There  is  no  careful  balancing  of  the 
amounts  of  time  or  money  or  strength  or  talent  given 
to  the  various  tasks  and  enterprises  of  the  kingdom 
so  as  to  make  them  count  for  the  most.  Much  religious 
work  is  carried  on  by  means  of  the  odds  and  ends,  the 
left  over  fragments  of  our  time  and  money.  Steward¬ 
ship  will  help  the  church  to  bigger  achievement  by  en¬ 
couraging  Christians  to  budget  their  time  and  strength 
and  thought  and  prayer  and  money  so  as  to  make  avail¬ 
able  the  needed  amounts  adequately  to  do  the  work  of 
the  kingdom. 

Christians  are  prone  to  give  their  service,  their 
thought,  their  prayer,  their  time,  as  well  as  their  mon¬ 
ey,  without  relation  to  the  whole  resource  they  pos¬ 
sess  and  without  relation  to  the  different  claims  of  the 
whole  task  assigned  by  God  to  the  Christian  Steward¬ 
ship  of  their  particular  church  and  day.  That  is  to 
say,  instead  of  sitting  down  to  count  the  cost  and  lay¬ 
ing  out  their  plans  (Luke  14:28)  they  start  in  to  build 
or  to  work  a  program  and  presently  they  find  they  have 
enough  energy,  talent,  time,  money  available  to  put 
in  the  foundation  and  the  ischeme  is  never  carried 
through.  Or  the  scheme  may  be  entirely  unrelated  to 
the  scheme  of  many  others,  all  intent  on  carrying  out 
each  his  own  little  scheme.  There  are  a  good  many 
foundations  laid  upon  which  the  building  has  never 
been  placed.  (Luke  14:28-33).  Christ  in  this  parable 
is  enjoining  budget-making — a  study  of  our  resources 
and  an  apportioning  of  them — so  as  to  ensure  that  we 
are  able  to  finish  our  job.  This  is  the  Christian  stew¬ 
ard’s  first  duty — make  a  budget — organize  his  re¬ 
sources  for  their  most  effective  and  intelligent  use. 
Our  serving  and  our  giving  must  be  made  efficient  and 


BUDGET  MAKING 


45 


consistent.  This  can  only  be  done  by  a  budget. 

“The  Christian  in  working  out  these  great  principles 
of  Christian  stewardship,  is  not,  therefore,  subject  to 
action  from  emotional  impulse.  He  considers  and 
weighs  and  judges.  He  preserves  a  correlation  and 
unity  in  his  activities  consistent  with  his  supreme  pur¬ 
pose.  He  must  have  a  system  by  which  his  general 
course  is  shaped  and  his  main  activities  determined.” 
He  must  have  some  kind  of  account-keeping  in  order 
to  ensure  the  wisest  and  most  advantageous  use  of  all 
he  has  and  is,  in  the  work  of  the  Kingdom  of  God. 

All  bookkeeping  and  budgeting  of  the  Christian 
steward  must  be  kept  free  from  legalism.  The  Christ¬ 
ian  cannot  be  under  law,  he  is  of  the  Spirit — all  law  is 
“our  schoolmaster  to  bring  us  unto  Christ.  But  after 
that  faith  is  come,  we  are  no  longer  under  a  school¬ 
master  for  ye  are  all  children  of  God  by  faith  in  Christ 
Jesus”  (Galatians  3:24-26).  “And  because  ye  are 
sons,  God  has  sent  forth  the  spirit  of  his  son  unto  your 
hearts  crying  Abba,  Father.  Wherefore  thou  art  no 
more  a  servant  but  a  son”  (Galatians  4:6-7).  The 
spirit  of  sonship  forbids  all  casuistry  and  legalism. 
Children  of  the  Father  live  with  him  and  for  him  by 
love  and  loyalty  and  never  by  a  measured  duty.  In 
the  story  of  the  two  sons  (Luke  15  :ll-32)  Jesus  shows 
the  elder  boy  remaining  at  home  with  the  father  but 
living  his  life  with  him  by  measured  duty  and  punc¬ 
tilious  formality.  He  is  not  living  by  love  and  he  is 
as  far  from  his  father  while  at  home  with  him  as  his 
prodigal  brother  who  went  into  the  far  country.  The 
slightest  taint  of  boastful  legalism  must  not  attach  it¬ 
self  to  one’s  bookkeeping  with  God.  We  are  sons  and 
we  live  by  loyalty  and  love. 

While  Christian  liberty  must  be  maintained,  still  the 
Christian  steward  must  have  system.  God  requires 


46 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


that  every  man  render  an  account  of  his  stewardship 
(Luke  16:1-12  especially  verse  2).  The  giving  of  ser¬ 
vice  and  money  spasmodically  and  unintelligently  can 
never  be  satisfactory  to  God  and  is  not  a  worthy  dis¬ 
charging  of  our  Stewardship  responsibilities.  No  one 
is  able  to  use  what  he  has  to  the  best  effect  if  he  has  not 
planned  for  each  item  in  connection  with  the  other 
items.  To  give  just  as  one  happens  to  feel  like,  or  to 
what  may  chance  to  make  the  appeal  is  not  the  practice 
of  good  stewards.  It  is  imperative  to  be  systematic 
and  orderly. 

It  is  not  possible  intelligently  to  discharge  one's 
trust,  unless  one  knows  what  has  actually  happened  in 
one’s  expenditures.  Not  many  who  have  not  kept  ac¬ 
counts  of  the  facts  know  what  they  are  doing  for  the 
kingdom.  Do  you  know  to  the  cent  how  much  you 
gave  to  the  church  last  year ?  Was  it  enough?  Do  you 
know  how  your  gifts  were  apportioned  ?  Did  you  share 
in  all  the  work  you  wanted  to?  Did  your  looseness 
tend  to  waste  of  God’s  property?  Waste  may  every¬ 
where  be  present,  unless  an  accurate  account  is  kept. 
But  not  only  is  waste  a  result  of  desultory  giving  and 
working,  but  honesty  is  involved.  Men  often  deceive 
themselves  as  to  what  they  really  are  doing  as  stew¬ 
ards.  Do  you  know  how  you  spend  your  money?  How 
much  do  you  spend  for  luxuries,  how  much  for  candy, 
for  amusement,  for  clothes,  etc.,  as  compared  with  the 
amount  you  use  in  promoting  the  work  of  the  kingdom 
of  God?  Dr.  Jowett  says,  “We  are  apt  to  be  gravely 
deceived  about  the  extent  of  our  beneficence  and  we 
vastly  exaggerate  the  amount  of  money  we  give  away. 
The  majority  of  people  have  no  idea  of  the  range  of 
their  beneficence.  They  do  not  know  how  much  or  how 
little  they  give  in  the  course  of  a  year.  But  the  basis  of 
their  estimate  is  always  on  the  side  of  generous  judg- 


BUDGET  MAKING 


47 


ment.  The  people  who  do  not  know  how  much  they 
give,  always  give  less  than  they  think  they  do.”  Ac¬ 
curate  accounting  is  necessary  to  rigid  honesty.  Some 
day  “when  the  books  are  opened”  (Revelation  20  :12) 
we  shall  be  asked  to  give  an  accounting  as  we  stand  be¬ 
fore  him  in  whose  right  hand  John  saw  “a  book.” 
(Revelations  5  :1). 

While  system  is  necessary  the  Christian  steward 
must  not  be  a  slave  to  system,  changing  the  spirit  into 
a  form.  One  must  guard  one’s  budget-making  from  all 
quibbling  with  God.  The  making  of  a  budget  is  not  in¬ 
tended  to  see  how  little  one  may  conscientiously  give 
to  God.  Whenever  definite  systematizing  encourages 
the  attitude  of  the  Pharisee  it  must  be  safe-guarded  by 
strong  reminders  of  the  fact  that  at  best  we  are  un¬ 
profitable  stewards.  (Luke  17:10). 

B — What  Is  to  be  Budgeted 

Budget  Making  is  the  systematizing  of  income  and 
expenditures.  A  budget  is  the  tabulation  of  what  we 
have  received  and  what  use  we  make  of  it  or  purpose 
to  make  of  it.  Budget  making,  that  is,  thought  out  ap¬ 
portioning  of  our  resources,  should  cover  all  our  other 
resources  besides  money,  such  as  time,  prayer,  concen¬ 
trated  thinking,  special  abilities,  privileges,  education, 
etc. 

I.  Especially  should  we  budget  our  material  re¬ 
sources.  And  our  discussion  of  budget  making,  like 
our  discussion  of  the  separated  portion,  will  be  pre¬ 
sented  mainly  in  relation  to  money  while  it  is  remem¬ 
bered  that  a  budget  system  should  have  a  place  in  the 
stewardship  of  all  life  in  all  its  phases. 

Budget  tabulation  allows  us  to  analyze  incomes  and 
spending  and  to  adjust  amounts  to  conform  to  honest 


48 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


stewardship  practice.  It  must  not  be  considered  too 
much  of  a  bother.  It  does  take  pains  and  requires  time 
but  it  is  demanded  by  the  honesty  and  the  sincerity  of 
our  profession  of  Christian  stewardship.  We  are  under 
obligation  to  know  how  much  of  God’s  property  has 
been  entrusted  to  us  by  him  and  how  we  have  handled 
it,  to  what  use  we  have  put  it.  Only  in  this  way  can  we 
measure  the  faithfulness  of  our  Stewardship. 

II.  Before  we  go  into  the  details  of  the  budgeting 
of  money  we  must  say  a  word  about  budgeting  time 
and  prayer. 

(a)  The  Budgeting  of  Time.  (Read  Ecclesiastes 
12:1;  Job  7:6;  Psalm  90:15;  Ephesians  5:16;  I  Peter 
3  :10;  Psalm  31 :15  ;  Ecclesiastes  3  :1-17 ;  II  Corinthians 
6:2;  Colossians  4:5;  I  Peter  1:17-25;  4  :1-5).  Time 
cannot  be  saved,  it  can  only  be  spent,  and  if  not  spent 
wisely  and  well  it  is  wasted.  There  is  no  way  of 
storing  it  ;once  gone  it  never  returns.  Hence  it  is  neces¬ 
sary  to  take  it  as  it  is  passing  and  put  it  to  the  very 
best  uses.  Odd  moments  may  be  utilized  to  the  great¬ 
est  advantage,  if  by  foresight  provision  is  made  to  pre¬ 
vent  them  from  going  to  waste.  By  making  a  time 
budget  not  only  will  waste  be  avoided  but  distribution 
will  be  made  more  wisely.  Discuss  the  following  sug¬ 
gestion  of  a  budget  for  your  time.  Do  you  think  of 
other  items  for  which  time  should  be  provided?  What 
amounts  of  time  would  you  plan  to  give  to  the  different 
items?  How  would  you  apportion  your  twenty-four 
hours  a  day?  Read  Arnold  Bennett’s  book  “How  to 
Live  on  Twenty-four  Hours  a  Day.”  In  it  he  speaks 
of  “The  Daily  Miracle.” 

“You  wake  up  in  the  morning,  and  lo,  your  purse 
magically  filled  with  twenty-four  hours  of  the 
manufactured  tissue  of  the  universe  of  your  life ! 
No  one  can  take  it  from  you.  It  is  unstealable.  No 


,  BUDGET  MAKING 


49 


one  receives  either  more  or  less  than  you  receive. 
Waste  your  infinitely  precious  commodity  as  much 
as  you  will,  and  the  supply  will  never  be  withheld 
from  you.  Moreover,  you  cannot  draw  on  the 
future.  Impossible  to  get  into  debt.  You  can  only 
waste  the  passing  moment.  You  cannot  waste  to¬ 
morrow;  it  is  kept  for  you/’ 

Outline — Budget  of  Time 

1.  Sleep 

2.  Work 

3.  Recreation 

(a)  Play — amusement 

(b)  Physical  Exercise 

(c)  Clubs — societies,  etc. 

4.  Self  Improvement 

(a)  Reading — Study — Lectures 

(b)  Music 

(c)  Art 

5.  Family  and  Social  Intercourse 

6.  Worship  ancf  Religious  Cultivation 

(a)  Public  Services  of  Worship 

(b)  Private  Bible  Reading 

(c)  Private  Prayer 

7.  Service 

(a)  Religious  (church  work) 

(b)  Community  (social  service) 

(c)  Politics 

What  do  you  do  with  your  “Twenty-four  Hours  a 
Day?”  You  have  the  management  as  a  stewardship 
responsibility  of  168  hours  a  week. 


50 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


What  standards  of  time  expenditure  have  you  set? 
Do  you  schedule  your  day  and  give  yourself  definite 
tasks  to  undertake?  Charles  Kingsley  said,  “Thank 
God  every  morning  when  you  get  up  that  you  have 
something  to  do  that  day  that  must  be  done  whether 
you  like  it  or  not.  Being  forced  to  work  and  to  do  your 
best  will  breed  in  you  self-control,  temperance, 
strength  of  will  and  a  hundred  other  virtues  that  the 
idle  will  never  know.”  There  is  no  other  way  than  by 
budgeting  your  time — giving  each  flying  moment 
something  to  keep  in  store,  by  which  you  can  prove 
yourself  a  good  steward. 

Professor  Robert  Dick  Wilson  of  Princeton  Theo¬ 
logical  Seminary  set  before  himself  as  a  young  man  a 
definite  apportioning  of  his  life.  He  planned  to  study 
the  Bible  and  cognate  languages  for  15  years — to  study 
Biblical  and  other  literature  in  these  languages  for  15 
years  and  then  spend  15  years  in  writing  down  the  re¬ 
sults  of  his  study.  He  has  carried  through  the  first  two 
periods  and  is  now  carrying  out  his  purpose  for  the 
third  period.  Have  you  any  time  schedule?  Do  you 
find  that  you  do  not  have  time  enough  or  have  you  time 
“to  burn?” 

Actually  try  to  budget  your  time,  using  the  suggest¬ 
ed  schedule  or  modify  it.  Perhaps  you  may  wish  to 
make  for  yourself  a  time  clock  like  the  one  made  by 
John  H.  Patterson  of  the  National  Cash  Register  Com¬ 
pany  at  Dayton,  Ohio. 

“This  viewpoint  in  the  use  of  time  determines  what 
things  will  be  left  undone,  what  things  will  be  attemp¬ 
ted.  But  it  does  not  insure  our  finding  time  for  all  the 
things  we  consider  essential.  It  is  like  trying  to  make 
three  hundred  dollars  cover  expenses  amounting  to 
six  hundred  dollars.  Either  the  expenses  must  be  cut 
down  or  the  amount  of  money  available  increased.” 


BUDGET  MAKING 


51 


“Since  there  are  only,  twenty-four  hours  in  any  day, 
evidently  the  balancing  of  the  time  account  will  neces¬ 
sitate  a  careful  budget  of  time  expenditure.  Such  a 
schedule  of  time  cannot  be  followed  slavishly  any 
more  than  the  train  dispatcher  can  guarantee  the 
arrival  of  his  trains.  But  he  would  not  think  of  work¬ 
ing  without  such  a  schedule  because  the  railroad  sys¬ 
tem  would  be  thrown  into  disastrous  confusion.  The 
dispatcher  necessarily  makes  frequent  revisions  and  he 
may  have  occasion  to  add  a  special  train  or  two;  but 
his  schedule  of  time  makes  it  possible  for  him  to  keep 
the  trains  moving  without  confusion  and  to  bring  them 
safely  to  their  destination.  A  schedule  of  time  simply 


52 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


means  the  intelligent  handling  of  the  day’s  appoint¬ 
ments.  The  danger  of  the  chartless  life  is  not  alone 
that  of  shipwreck ;  it  is  that  the  boat  has  no  real  chance 
of  making  the  harbor.”  Make  your  own  time  budget 
and  live  royally  and  profitably  on  your  24  hours  a  day. 

(b)  The  Budgeting  of  Prayer.  Christian  prayer  is 
the  stewardship  of  power.  Much  prayer  made  by 
Christians  is  utterly  pagan  in  character.  Prayer  is  not 
a  means  to  get  something  from  God — a  key  to  the 
divine  treasure  chest.  It  is  a  trust  of  power  to  be  used 
to  achieve  something  with  God.  Good  stewardship  of 
this  prayer-partnership  with  God  requires : 

(1)  A  sincere  desire  in  the  heart.  It  will  not  do  to 
pray  mechanically.  Prayer  to  be  effective  must  be  the 
heart’s  sincere  desire. 

“Stir  me,  O  stir  me  Lord,  I  care  not  how, 

But  stir  my  heart  in  passion  for  the  world. 

Stir  me  to  give,  to  go,  but  most  to  pray: 

Stir,  till  the  blood-red  banner  be  unfurled 
O’er  lands  that  still  in  deepest  darkness  lie, 

O’er  deserts  where  no  cross  is  lifted  high. 

“Stir  me,  O  stir  me,  Lord.  Thy  heart  was  stirred 
By  love’s  intensest  fire,  till  thou  didst  give 
Thine  only  Son,  thy  best  beloved  one, 

Even  to  the  dreadful  cross,  that  I  might  live : 

Stir  me  to  give  myself  so  back  to  thee, 

That  Thou  canst  give  Thyself  again  through  me.” 

(2)  Intelligent  concern  for  the  object.  Prayer  can 
be  administered  effectively  by  good  stewards  only 
when  they  pray  with  the  understanding.  We  must  be¬ 
come  intelligent  to  the  need  and  pray  with  knowledge. 
This  leads  to  system — method  in  the  administering  of 
prayer — saving  one’s  prayers  from  lopsidedness — per¬ 
sonal  bias — inadequate  range — lack  of  objective — bad 


BUDGET  MAKING 


53 


aiming,  etc.  Have  you  ever  inventoried  the  content 
and  extent  of  your  prayers?  How  honestly  and  fairly 
are  you  administering  this  trust  from  God — prayer? 

Then  too,  the  items  in  your  prayer  budget  tell  a  real 
story  of  the  reach  of  your  discipleship.  Over  what  area 
does  your  discipleship  extend?  Is  it  bounded  by  the 
circumference  of  your  own  little  life?  Is  your  chief 
Christian  concern,  the  saving  of  your  own  soul?  Is 
your  discipleship  of  Christ  bounded  by  the  four  narrow 
walls  of  your  own  family  group?  Do  you  pray  as  one 
man  did, 

God  bless  me 
And  my  wife 
John  and  his  wife 
Us  four  and  no  more. 

Amen  1 

Give  your  prayer  life  a  schedule,  a  thought-through 
goal  and  a  world  breadth. 

(c)  Budget-Making  a  Popular  Indoor  Sport. 

Budget  making  is  necessary  if  we  are  to  keep  the 
proper  perspective  in  the  use  of  our  money.  There  are 
now  available  many  outline  budgets  to  help  one  arrange 
his  own  schedule  of  disbursements.  There  are  com¬ 
mercially  prepared  Budget  Books  planned  to  aid  in 
keeping  careful  account  of  income  and  expenditures. 
Apply  to  your  own  Church's  Stewardship  Department 
for  suggestions.  The  Stewardship  Department  of  the 
Presbyterian  Church  issues  a  booklet  for  this  purpose 
which  is  entitled  “A  Budget  Book  with  a  Conscience." 
This  title  is  challenging  and  suggests  that  not  all 

budget  making  is  done  with  a  conscience.  We  are 

9  * 

stewards  and  the  allotting  of  our  income  to  various 
interests — giving,  saving,  food,  dress,  recreation,  self- 


54 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


improvement — (should  be  undertaken  with  conscien¬ 
tious.  care.  Here  is  where  we  may  truly  take  up  our 
cross  and  follow  Christ.  It  is  at  the  point  of  our 
budget  making  that  the  genuineness  of  our  Christian 
profession  is  made  apparent.  The  Christian  use  of 
money  is  of  vital  spiritual  importance.  Christ  never 
asked  for  nor  received  mere  mental  acceptance.  He 
tied  discipleship  up  with  a  man’s  possessions.  To 
the  rich  young  ruler  he  said,  “Go  sell  that  thou  hast.’’ 
(Matthew  19:21).  To  another  prospect  he  said,  “The 
foxes  have  holes  but  the  Son  of  Man  hath  not  where 
to  lay  His  head.”  (Matthew  8:20).  It  was  when 
Zaccheus  straightened  out  his  money  affairs  that  Jesus 
said  “Today  is  salvation  come  to  this  house.”  If  you 
have  never  made  out  a  budget,  begin  now  and  make  a 
budget  with  a  conscience,  or  better  still,  the  budget  of 
a  sincere  Christian  steward. 

Some  people  find  it  very  hard  to  see  over  their  own 
doorstep  with  the  naked  eye.  The  real  story  of  their 
lives  is  this : 

“I  had  a  little  teaparty 
This  afternoon  at  three. 

’Tvvas  very  small — 

Three  guests  in  all — 

Just  I,  Myself,  and  Me. 

Myself  ate  all  the  sandwiches, 

While  I  drank  up  the  tea. 

’Twas  also  I  who  ate  the  pie 
And  passed  the  cake  to  Me.” 

Their  interest  is  pretty  much  confined  to  what  hap¬ 
pens  within  their  own  four  walls,  in  their  own  little 
town  or  their  own  church.  Now  to  be  interested  in 
one’s  church  is  a  good  thing.  But  one  who  is  interested 
in  his  own  church  only,  is  never  able  to  do  very  much 
for  that  church.  He  is  worth  far  more  to  his  own  local 


BUDGET  MAKING 


55 


church  whose  interest  extends  far  beyond  it,  when  he 
has  something  like  the  feeling  which  Jesus  had  when 
he  looked  out  over  the  multitudes  and  was  filled  with 
compassion  for  them.  “The  light  which  shines  farthest 
shines  brightest  at  home”  and  the  man  whose  heart  is 
filled  with  interest  and  sympathy  for  people  at  a  dis¬ 
tance  from  him  has  a  heart  all  the  more  ready  to  take 
upon  it  the  burdens  of  things  nearest.  (See  Galatians 
6 :2 ;  Luke  6 :32 ; 
world-contacts. 

In  our  discus¬ 
sion  of  the  a- 
mount  of  the  pro¬ 
portion  set  aside 
for  giving — the 
Separated  Por¬ 
tion — we  have 
urged  that  it  be 
at  least  one-tenth 
This  is  to  be 
wholly  unto  the 
Lord  and  used 
with  strict  hon- 


[  John  3:17).  Give  your  budget 


JOHN 

STEWART 

KENNEDY 

FroB  lie  Start  *1  Hie  Baiiseu  Career  Wu 
A  Trtber 

A  VERY  OLD  RECORD  BOOK 
BORE  THE  HEADING,  “BE¬ 
HOLD,  THE  TENTH  OF  ALL, 

1  GIVE  UNTO  THEE” 

Ovt  ef  Hi*  Estate 

$30,000,000 

Were  Gieeii  to  For1.  ui  Benevolent  Close* 
Coverin,  All  Phases  ol  Homan  Need 

THOSE  WHO  TREAT  THEIR 
POSSESSIONS  AS  A  TRUST 
Are  Being  Constantly  Moulded 
to  the  Image  oi  Him 
Who  Said,  “My  Meat  is  to  Finish 
His  Work” 


esty  for  others.  We  quote  what  Dr.  Jowett  says  upon 
this  point — “It  is  probably  true  of  the  majority  of 
people  that  before  their  beneficence  is  active,  their 
feelings  have  to  be  excited  and  their  emotions  have  to 
be  fervid  and  boiling.  And  so  the  appeals  are  com¬ 
monly  directed  to  the  feelings,  and  time  after  time 
speakers  have  to  play  upon  the  emotions  in  order  to 
elicit  support  for  .such  ministeries  as  hospitals  and 
home  and  foreign  missions.  The  consequence  is,  that 

giving  is  as  uncertain  and  spasmodic  as  the  movement 


of  the  emotions,” 


56 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


“We  must  not  only  put  our  homage  and  conscience 
into  our  beneficence,  we  must  put  method  into  it. 
And  I  am  sure  that  part  of  this  method  must  be 
the  assignment  of  a  certain  minimum  proportion  of  our 
income  to  ministries  of  beneficence.  The  minimum 
must  not  be  less  than  a  tenth.  If  we  all  gave  a  tenth 
of  all  that  we  possessed,  the  appeals  which  call  to  our 
beneficences  would  be  met  with  overflowing  wealth 
and  sufficiency.  But  we  must  fix  the  minimum  not 
only  for  the  sake  of  the  bounty  but  for  our  comfort  and 
peace.  There’s  a  great  sense  of  power  and  satisfaction 
when  we  know  just  where  we  are,  and  what  we  are 
doing,  and  what  we  are  able  to  do.” 

It  should  be  recognized  by  all  good  stewards  that 
the  first  charge  against  their  account  is  the  Separated 
Portion — the  share  set  aside  in  acknowledgment  of 
God’s  ownership.  We  should  first  of  all  set  apart 
God’s  portion  for  giving  and  then  budget  the  remainder 
to  meet  the  other  calls  of  life.  It  will  not  do  for  a 
steward  to  first  spend  all  he  thinks  he  must  for  his  own 
needs  and  then  out  of  what  remains  give  something 
to  promote  God’s  kingdom.  That  is  to  say  again,  our 
spending  must  not  be  the  regulator  of  our  giving,  but 
giving  must  determine  our  spending.  The  Separated 
Portion  is  a  first  charge. 

Many  business  houses  are  ofifering  help  to  their  cus¬ 
tomers  in  this  matter  of  budget-makingv  The  follow¬ 
ing  suggestions  were  sent  out  by  a  large  New  York 
Bond  Broker  to  encourage  people  to  keep  budgets  in 
order  to  accumulate  a  surplus  for  investment  in  stocks 
and  Bonds. 

Ought  not  Christians  be  interested  in  budget  mak¬ 
ing  in  order  to  see  how  much  of  their  income  can  be 
made  available  for  investment  in  the  kingdom  enter¬ 
prise?  Can  a  Christian  steward,  concerned  in  knowing 


BUDGET  MAKING 


57 


the  facts  in  order  to  fulfill  his  stewardship,  afford  to 
be  less  wise  than  the  children  of  this  world,  (Luke 
16:8)  who  have  only  this  world’s  interest  at  heart? 
This  form  is  as  the  business  firm  issued  it,  with  but  a 
few  alterations. 

How  to  Budget  Your  Incomes 

“The  first  step  in  planning  a  systematic  program  of 
expenditures  is  to  know  how  much  of  your  income  is 
required  to  cover  necessary  living  expenses.  Indi¬ 
vidual  standards  of  living  vary,  but  in  all  cases  there 
is  the  dividing  line  between  prudent  expenditure  and 
extravagance.  Anyone  who  is  seriously  interested  in 
making  progress  toward  faithful  stewardship  will  find 
out  where  the  line  should  be  drawn. 

The  best  way  to  do  this  is  by  making  a  budget  of 
expenses  based  on  income — which  simply  means  divid¬ 
ing  the  various  items  of  living  expenses  into  groups 
and  placing  a  limit  on  each  group  in  proportion  to  the 
amount  of  income.  Every  business  firm  must  do  this 
or  it  could  not  continue  to  exist.  Our  government 
is  doing  it  after  finding  that,  without  a  budget  system, 
expenses  run  wild  and  continually  exceed  appropria¬ 
tions.  A  personal  or  family  budget  is  much  simpler 
than  a  corporation  or  government  budget — easier  to 
establish  and  control.  Individuals  and  families  will 
find  upon  examination  that  the  amounts  they  spend  for 
ordinary  expenses  are  rather  uniform  in  proportion  to 
income  over  annual  periods.  Hence,  making  a  budget 
is  just  a  matter  of  examining  and  classifying  your  ex¬ 
penditures.” 

It  may  be  of  assistance  to  study  the  typical  budgets 
and  charts  given  on  following  pages.  It  is  not  ex¬ 
pected  that  these  typical  budgets  will  exactly  fit  the 


58 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


requirements  of  the  reader,  but  they  may  serve  as  a 
general  guide  in  determining  a  budget  which  will  fit 
any  given  case. 


Use  This  Page  To 

Review  Your  Spending  and  To  Organize  Your  Budget 
Consult  Charts  on  Following  Pages 


My  Income  Last  Year  was  $ 


Giving 

Food 

Clothing 

Operating  • 
Expenses 

Culture 

Luxuries 

Savings 

Totals 


HOW  SPENT 

BUDGET 

FOR  NEW  YEAR 

Amount  Per  Cent 

Amount  Per  Cent 

Typical  Budget  for  Various  Incomes  for  an  Average  American  Family 

Two  Adults  and  Two  Children 


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Do  you  think  that  these  proportions  are  fair?  See  the  suggested  proportions  of  the  next  page.  Is  the 
ratio  the  practice  of  the  people  generally  ?  How  commonly  does  the  practice  of  the  .  church  conform  t 
ratio — - — 1.2  per  cent  for  giving?  What  per  cent  of  your  income  do  you  devote  to  giving? 


Typical  Budgets  for  Various  Incomes  for  an  Average  American  Family 

(Two  Adults  and  Two  Children  of  School  Age) 

Figures  Based  on  Conditions  and  Living  Standards,  October  1922 


These  figures  and  the  graph  following  are  from  “Family  Budgets  Made  Easy”  by  C.  F.  Breitzke.  Used  by  permission. 
Lefax,  Incorporated,  Publishers.  * 

Compare  figures  in  this  table  with  those  of  the  business  house  on  preceeding  page  and  also  with  those  of  the  graph 
and  table  following.  & 

See  also  suggestions  in  “Budget  Book  with  A  Conscience.” 

How  do  the  figures  of  your  present  spending  plan  compare  with  those  given  in  the  table  for  your  income? 

PLAN  YOUR  GIVING,  SPENDING,  SAVING  AND  ACCOU  NT  FOR  YOUR  STEWARDSHIP! 


MONTHLY  AVERAGE  TOTAL  NET  INCOME 


Percentage  Distribution  of  Various  Incomes. 


TYPICAL  BUDGETS  FOR  VARIOUS  INCOMES 

For  an  Average  American  Family — Two  Adults  and  Two  Children 


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BUDGET  MAKING 


63 


A  “Budget”  is  what  you  say  you  are  going  to  do  with 
your  income.  An  “accounting”,  on  the  other  hand,  is 
the  record  of  what  you  actually  do  with  it. 

But  it  is  seldom  that  any  plan  works  out  at  first  trial. 
The  fact  that  you  fail  to  live  according  to  your  budget 
the  first  month,  or  the  second,  or  the  third  in  no  reason 
for  discouragement. 

Study  it;  readjust  it!  once  rightly  adjusted,  it  will 
give  you  ample  returns  for  all  disquiet  it  may  have 
caused  you  in  the  beginning. 

It  would  be  well  for  a  beginner  to  approach  a  stand¬ 
ard  budgeting  form  with  the  thought  that  while  all  its 
columns  may  be  of  use  to  someone,  he  himself  need  not 
use  all.  Everyone  will  have  some  empty  columns.  No 
two  budgets  will  be  just  alike. 

The  tables  on  the  preceeding  pages  and  the  graph  on 
the  next  page  will  help  you  to  make  your  own  budget. 

'The  graph  of  average  budgets  on  the  following 
page  was  prepared  by  A.  A.  Reimer,  C.  E.  and  is  in¬ 
tended  only  as  a  guide  in  developing  your  own  budget. 
These  figures  are  averages  only  and  must  be  modified 
to  meet  the  limitations  of  your  particular  circumstan¬ 
ces.  However,  in  making  modifications,  remember 
that  you  are  a  steward  “of  the  manifold  grace  of  God”, 
that  “it  is  required  in  stewards,  that  a  man  be  found 
faithful”,  that  we  are  admonished  “Upon  the  first  day 

of  the  week  let  each  one  of  you  lay  by  him  in  store, 
as  he  may  prosper, — ”,  that,  in  addition  to  “God  so 
loved- --that  he  gave---,”  we  have  Paul's  testimony  to 
the  Macedonian  churches,  “For  according  to  their 
power,  I  bear  witness,  yea  and  beyond  their  power, 
they  gave  of  their  own  accord,  ---,  but  first  they  gave 
their  own  selves  to  the  Lord  — ”. 


AVERAGE  ANNUAL  BUDGETS 
FOR  VARIOUS  INCOMES 


1.  Average  American  Family— 

2  Adults,  2  Children  of  School  Age 


Income 
$1,500 


Income 
$5,000 


Income 
$2,50 


Income 

$10,000 


2.  The  Individual 


Income 
$1,000 


Income 

$2,000 

3d 


Giving 

KEY*  Food 


Culture 


Clothing  HUH] 


KrH 


BUDGET  MAKING 


65 


EXPLANATION  OF  ITEMS  IN  GRAPH 

Giving  — includes  gifts  of  money  or  possessions. 
Includes  gifts  to  church  and  other  benevolence 
agencies. 

Food — includes  home  and  outside  meals,  business 
lunches,  boarding  charges,  home  gardening,  home 
chicken  raising  and  similar  items. 

Clothing—  -includes  usual,  ordinary  clothing  (not  spec¬ 
ial  items  which  should  generally  be  considered  as 
“luxuries”),  tailor  and  dress  maker  charges. 

Operating  Expenses — includes  shelter  (rent  or  lodg¬ 
ing  charges),  heat,  fuel,  water,  light,  ice,  maintenance 
of  house  and  property  and  house  furnishings,  taxes 
(personal,  property  and  income),  mortgage  interest, 
telephone,  insurance  (except  life),  hired  help,  fares, 
automobile  operation  and  upkeep,  personal  expenses 
and  gifts,  upkeep  of  clothes,  laundry,  medical 
charges,  and  similar  items. 

Culture — includes  education,  travel  for  recreation  or 
education,  vacations,  lectures,  concerts,  books  and 
magazines,  social  clubs,  sentiment  expressions  and 
other  items  intended  for  cultural  development. 

Luxuries — includes  non-essentials  of  all  varieties  such 
as  theatre,  tobacco,  confections,  jewelry,  some  forms 
of  clothing,  novelties,  manicure,  shaves  and  shines. 

Saving — includes  bank  savings,  investments  and  secur¬ 
ities  (stocks,  bonds,  property),  life  insurance,  pay¬ 
ments  on  home,  building  and  loan  association  and 
similar  items. 


66 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


D.  Budget  Questions 

Among  many  other  questions  raised  by  this  matter 
of  budget  making,  only  the  following  can  be  briefly 
discussed  here.  The  student  should  record  others 
that  arise  in  his  mind.  Have  you  settled  the  per  cent, 
amount  of  your  Separated  Portion?  Do  you  count 
this  a  maximum  or  a  minimum? 

The  question  of  saving  is  a  very  vital  one  in  steward¬ 
ship.  What  percentage  of  one’s  income  do  you  think 
should  go  into  the  saving  account? 

How  much  should  be  spent  for  self-improvement? 

What  is  luxury?  Does  the  standard  of  what  consti¬ 
tutes  a  luxury  change  with  differing  circumstances? 

Can  a  time  budget  be  made  and  lived  up  to,  at  all 
strictly? 

Should  children  be  encouraged  in  keeping  accounts 
by  providing  them  an  allowance? 

What  may  a  wife  do  in  the  matter  of  giving?  Should 
she  be  furnished  an  allowance  worthy  of  her  service  in 
the  home?  Could  some  fifty-fifty  division  of  income 
between  husband  and  wife  be  arranged? 

Must  a  budget  be  so  iron-clad  that  no  readjustment 
of  its  items  is  possible  to  meet  new  emergencies  which 
may  arise? 

How  much  should  be  spent  for  amusements? 

How  would  you  determine  what  was  extravagance? 
Try  to  make  a  definition  of  extravagance. 

Would  the  proportions  allotted  to  various  items  be 
altered  by  responsibility  for  dependents? 

“A  weekly  budget  for  a  business  girl  earning  $18. 
per  week,  assigned  40  cents  to  amusements  and  10 
cents  to  church.  Four  times  as  much  for  “movies”  as 
for  God.”  Is  this  sort  of  proportioning  at  all  prevalent? 


BUDGET  MAKING 


67 


What  do  the  figures  of  your  budget  reveal? 

Perhaps  the  main  reason  why  so  many  people  fail  to 
keep  account  with  God  is  that  they  do  not  begin  early 
enough.  The  time  to  learn  that  lesson  is  in  childhood. 
“Remember  now  thy  Creator  in  the  days  of  thy  youth.” 
(Ecclesiastes  12:1.)  Open  your  stewardship  account 
as  soon  as  possible.  Help  the  members  of  your  Young 
People’s  Society  to  begin  the  practice  of  systematizing 
their  lives  and  their  giving.  A  certain  pastor  helped 
his  young  people  to  face  the  facts  of  their  spending.  He 
showed  by  comparison  the  amounts  they  spent  upon 
themselves  with  what  they  gave  for  others.  Your  pas¬ 
tor  can  be  interested  to  help  you  to  do  this  for  your 
society.  Many  banks  issue  books  and  information  con¬ 
cerning  budget-making  and  thrift.  Perhaps  you  could 
enlist  one  of  the  officials  of  your  bank  to  speak  on  the 
subject  of  budgets  and  so  create  interest  in  this  all- 
important  matter  of  being  systematic  as  Christian  stew¬ 
ards  in  the  handling  of  our  time  and  talents  and  pos¬ 
sessions  as  trusts  from  God. 

W e  have  only  so  much  of  life,  so  much  of  time  and 
strength  and  skill  and  money  to  manage  for  God  and 
the  high  interests  of  life.  We  all  desire  to  make  it 
count  for  the  most.  As  Edgar  Rowland  Sill  has  put 
it  in  “The  Choice”, 

Only  so  much  of  power  each  day — 

So  much  nerve  force  brought  in  play ; 

If  it  goes  for  politics  or  trade, 

Ends  gained  or  money  made, 

You  have  it  not  for  the  soul  and  God — 

The  choice  is  yours,  to  soar  or  plod. 

So  much  water  in  the  rill : 

It  may  go  to  turn  the  miller’s  wheel 
Or  sink  in  the  desert,  or  flow  on  free 


68 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


To  brighten  its  banks,  in  meadows  green, 

Till  broadening  out,  fair  fields  between, 

It  streams  to  the  moon-enchanted  sea. 

Only  so  little  power  each  day: 

Week  by  week  days  slide  away; 

Ere  the  life  goes,  what  shall  it  be — 

A  trade — a  game — a  mockery, 

Or  the  gate  of  a  rich  Eternity? 

To  make  the  “Only  so  much”  of  our  lives  to  count 
the  most  for  Christ,  all  need  to  systematize  their  ex¬ 
penditure — live  by  a  budget. 

Christ  is  counting  on  us. 

Mr.  S.  D.  Gordon  closes  one  of  his  remarkable  ad¬ 
dresses  as  follows:  The  angel  Gabriel  and  the  Master 
are  talking  together.  Gabriel  is  saying:  “Master,  you 
died  for  the  whole  world  down  there,  did  you  not?” 

“Yes.” 

“And  do  they  all  know  about  it?” 

“Oh,  no;  only  a  few  in  Palestine  know  about  it  so 
far.” 

“Well,  Master,  what  is  your  plan?  What  have  you 
done  about  telling  the  world  that  you  died  for  them? 
What  is  your  plan?” 

“Well,”  the  Master  is  supposed  to  answer,  “I  asked 
Peter  and  Janies  and  John  and  little  Scotch  Andrew  and 
some  more  of  them  down  there  just  to  make  it  the  busi¬ 
ness  of  their  lives  to  tell  others,  and  others  are  to  tell 
others  until  the  last  man  in  the  farthest  circle  has  heard 
the  story  and  has  felt  the  thrilling  and  thralling  power 
of  it.” 

And  Gabriel  answered,  with  a  sort  of  hesitating  re¬ 
luctance,  as  though  he  could  see  difficulties  in  the  work¬ 
ing  of  the  plan,  “Yes,  but  suppose  Peter  fails — suppose 
after  a  while  John  simply  does  not  tell  others — suppose 
their  descendants,  the  successors  away  off  in  the  first 


BUDGET  MAKING 


69 


edge  of  the  twentieth  century  get  so  busy  about  things 
that  they  do  not  tell  others — what  then?”  And  Ga¬ 
briel,  thinking  of  the  difference  to  the  man  who  hasn’t 
been  told,  says,  “What  plan  have  you  then?  And 

back  comes  that  quiet  voice  of  Jesus: 

“Gabriel,  I  haven’t  made  any  other  plans.  I  am 
counting  on  them.” 

QUESTIONS  ON  STUDY  III. 

BUDGET  MAKING 

1.  What  is  the  importance  of  budgeting  and  book¬ 
keeping  to  the  Christian  steward?  What  spirit  should 
govern  the  steward  in  his  budgeting  and  book-keeping? 

2.  What  is  the  tendency  of  the  average  steward, 
however  well-meaning,  unless  he  budgets  his  time  and 
money? 

3.  Do  you  keep  a  budget  for  your  own  expense  and 
time?  (The  class  may  have  a  general  discussion  on 
this  and  compare  experiences.) 

4.  Discuss  the  making  of  a  time  budget.  Outline 
as  accurately  as  you  can  how  you  yourself  spend  your 
time.  After  discussion,  determine  worthy  individual 
standards  of  time  expenditure  in  each  of  the  various 
items. 

5.  What  is  the  Christian  Steward’s  concept  of 
prayer?  How  can  we  wisely  administer  prayer ? 

6.  If  you  earn  a  regular  income,  and  are  not  already 
budgeting,  make  out  with  the  help  of  the  budget  table, 
a  plan  of  expenditures  for  yourself.  Compare  it  with 
your  approximate  expenditures  for  the  present  year. 
Note  differences. 


70 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


7.  What  does  your  budget  show  about  you  in  your 
giving,  your  expenditures? 

8.  Discuss  the  budget  proportions  presented  by 
Mr.  Breitzke  as  compared  with  the  budget  suggested 
by  the  business  firm  on  page  59. 

9.  Give  a  summary  of  Dr.  Jowett’s  remarks  about 
giving. 

10.  What  should  be  the  first  charge  against  the 
Christian  steward’s  budget  book? 

11.  Discuss  methods  of  popularizing  budget-  mak¬ 
ing  in  the  Young  People’s  Society. 

12.  What  claim  have  the  needs  of  his  church  upon 
the  steward  ? 

13.  What  and  why  is  the  50-50  standard? 

It  is  to  be  remembered  that  tables  and  charts  are 
computed  for  a  family  of  four.  Young  people,  with 
no  or  few  extra  personal  responsibilities,  should  alter 
certain  percentage  allotments.  They  should  in  gen¬ 
eral  reduce  the  spending  proportion,  carefully  avoid¬ 
ing  luxury  items.  In  most  cases  young  people  with 
only  themselves  to  keep  should  give  a  larger  percentage 
to  “Benevolences”  than  is  suggested  above  and  the 
“savings”  proportion  should  also  be  increased.  Con¬ 
sult  graph  on  page  64  suggesting  proportions  for 
single  individuals. 

What  is  your  comment  on  the  fact  that  Mr.  Breitzke 
on  page  60  begins  the  percentage  for  Benevolence  at 
3.3%  for  a  $900.  income  and  does  not  reach  10%  until 
the  income  is  $3000?  How  do  these  proportions  of 
Mr.  Breitzke’s  bear  upon  the  teaching  of  Chapter  II 
dealing  with  the  Separated  Portion? 

Summarize  your  disbursements  for  the  past  year 
(roughly  if  you  do  not  have  accurate  accounts)  and 
compare  with  the  figures  for  your  income  given  in  the 
various  tables. 


“A  coin  is  so  much  minted  life,  a  holy  thing. 
It  is  a  sacramental  thing  like  the  bread  and 
wine  of  the  communion,  the  outward  and  vis¬ 
ible  sign  of  life  fruitfully  expended.” 

Richard  Roberts 


STUDY  IV 

THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 

O  talk  of  stewardship  as  just  a  means  of 
raising  money  for  Christian  work  is 
totally  to  misrepresent  the  scriptural 
teaching  concerning  stewardship.  On 
the  other  hand,  to  talk  of  money  as  if  it 
were  something  sordid  and  unspiritual  is  equally  to 
misrepresent  the  teaching  of  Scripture  concerning 
money.  Many  people  are  inclined  to  think  that  we 
should  avoid  talking  about  the  Christian  life  in  terms 
of  money  and  discuss  it  in  more  spiritual  terms.  But 
the  Bible  does  not  agree  to  this  idea. 

The  most  talked-of  topic  in  the  Bible  is  money — 
property,  things,  possessions,  wealth.  Everywhere 
the  Bible  reveals  God  as  deeply  concerned  about  the 
relation  of  man  to  things,  especially  to  his  possessions. 
Sixteen  out  of  Christ’s  thirty-eight  parables  deal  with 
money.  One  out  of  every  eight  verses  in  the  four 
Gospels  has  something  to  say  about  money.  Paul  says 
God  intended  that  the  things  he  made  and  bestowed 
upon  men  should  reveal  him  and  be  a  means  of  fellow¬ 
ship  with  him.  “For  the  invisible  things  of  him  from 
the  creation  of  the  world  are  clearly  seen,  being  under¬ 
stood  by  the  things  that  are  made,  even  his  eternal 
power  and  Godhead ;  so  that  they  are  without  excuse.” 
(Romans  1:20).  Things  should  have  been,  as  God  in¬ 
tended,  a  channel  of  grace.  God’s  gifts  should  have 


72 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


given  men  such  a  sense  of  God’s  goodness,  should  have 
enable  men  to  enjoy  the  divine  fellowship,  should 
have  cultivated  in  man  sympathy  and  love  and  un¬ 
selfishness  in  the  ministry  of  these  things  which  be¬ 
longed  to  God  but  of  which  man  was  custodian.  But 
men  refused  to  let  things  keep  God  in  their  minds  and 
hearts.  They  took  God’s  things  and  claimed  them  for 
their  own  and  used  them  selfishly  and  so  Paul  says 
when  men  misused  things,  God’s  gift  to  them  through 
which  God  desired  to  be  known  unto  them,  then 
God  gave  them  over.  When  they  glorified  not  God, 
as  the  Owner  of  all  the  things  he  had  made,  neither 
were  thankful  for  the  use  of  his  gifts;  but  became  vain 
in  their  imaginations  and  counted  that  they  themselves 
were  the  owners  of  what  they  possessed,  God  gave 
them  up  to  all  uncleanness.  “Because  that,  when  they 
knew  God,  they  glorified  him  not  as  God,  neither  were 
thankful;  but  became  vain  in  their  imaginations,  and 
their  foolish  heart  was  darkened.”  (Romans  1:21-31. 
Note  especially  verses  29-31).  This  passage  gives  a 
list  of  the  horrid  brood  of  crimes  which  follow  in  the 
train  of  man’s  failure  to  put  things — God’s  gifts — in 
their  right  place.  It  is  to  be  noticed  that  in  the  very 
midst  of  fornication,  wickedness,  murder,  hatred  of 
God,  Paul  set  down  covetousness.  We  do  not  always 
think  of  covetousness  as  being  in  the  class  with  murder 
and  fornication  but  Paul  in  another  place  says  covet¬ 
ousness  is  idolatry  (Colossians  3:5).  The  sins  grow¬ 
ing  out  of  possessions,  property,  wealth,  money,  are 
truly  hateful.  You  cannot  read  this  partial  list  without 
revulsion  and  shuddering — miserliness,  greed,  unkind¬ 
ness,  envy,  pride,  hard-heartedness,  hatred,  murder, 
unjustness,  mercenariness,  selfishness,  pitilessness. 
There  are  many  more.  The  student  should  name  some 
that  suggest  themselves  to  him. 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 


73 


Though  the  Scriptures  are  a  record  of  man’s  failure 
as  a  steward,  a  trustee,  and  so  full  of  warnings  against 
the  dangers  of  money,  (See  Psalm  62:10;  Proverbs 
23:3-5;  Matthew  13:22;  Mark  10:23:  I  Timothy  6:17; 
Luke  12:16-21;  James  5:1-4;  Luke  16:19-31),  nowhere 
does  the  Bible  speak  of  money,  property,  wealth  as  in¬ 
herently  evil.  But  rather  God  is  said  to  give  men 
“power  to  get  wealth.”  (Deuteronomy  8:18).  See 
also  Proverbs  10  :15  ;  Matthew  25  :14.  Money  is  not  the 
root  of  all  evil.  Paul  says,  “The  love  of  money  is  the 
root  of  all  kinds  of  evil.”  (1  Timothy  6:10  R.V.). 
Again  and  again  the  Bible  points  out  the  perils  of 
money  (Mark  10:23;  Luke  6:24;  Matthew  6:19).  But 
money  is  not  itself  an  evil.  It  is  God’s  gift.  Andrew 
Murray,  in  his  book  on  “Money,”  says  “Money,  the 
cause  of  so  much  temptation  and  sin  and  sorrow  and 
eternal  loss;  money,  as  it  is  received  and  administered 
and  distributed  at  the  feet  of  Jesus,  the  Lord  of  the 
Treasury,  becomes  one  of  God’s  choicest  channels  of 
grace  to  myself  and  to  others.”  Money,  a  sacrament, 
is  exactly  what  God  intended  it  to  be.  All  creation  was 
to  reveal  and  minister  God  to  men.  (Psalms  19:1-4) 
Things,  possessions  were  intended  to  be  channels  of 
grace — God’s  ways  of  living  with  and  in  men. 

Money  often  is  spoken  of  disparagingly,  as  some¬ 
thing  sordid  and  debased,  as  a  sort  of  necessary  evil, 
as  filthy  lucre ;  but  it  is  a  good  when  it  becomes  what 
God  intended  it  to  be.  Money  may  become  a  blinder 
to  hide  spiritual  beauty  from  man’s  eyes;  but  properly 
used,  it  may  be  a  window  through  which  we  may 
catch  a  glimpse  of  God.  “Bring  ye  all  the  tithes  into 
the  storehouse,  that  there  may  be  meat  in  mine  house, 
and  prove  me  now  herewith,  saith  the  Lord  of  hosts, 
if  I  will  not  open  you  the  windows  of  heaven,  and  pour 
you  out  a  blessing,  that  there  shall  not  be  room  enough 


74 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


to  receive  it.”  (Malachi  3:10).  What  are  you  letting 
your  money  do  for  you?  Is  it  blinding  you,  or  is  it 
opening  up  new  fields  for  your  spiritual  growth? 

The  heading  of  this  study  is  “The  Miracle  of 
Money.”  How  is  money  a  miracle? 

A.  It  is  a  miracle  in  that  it  is  not  merely  material. 
Money  is  more  than  metal.  It  is  vital,  living,  human. 
Money  is  just  so  much  coined  manhood,  so  much  of 
stored-up  human  effort.  Dr.  A.  F.  Schauffler  says, 
“Money  is  myself.  I  am  a  laboring  man,  we  will  say, 
and  can  handle  a  pickaxe,  and  I  hire  myself  out  for  a 
week  at  $2.00  a  day.  At  the  close  of  the  week  I  get 
$12.00  and  I  put  it  in  my  pocket.  What  is  that  $12.00? 
It  is  a  week’s  worth  of  my  muscle  put  into  greenbacks 
and  pocketed ;  that  is,  I  have  got  a  week’s  worth  of 
myself  in  my  pocket.  Or,  I  am  a  clerk  and  I  hire  my¬ 
self  out,  being  an  intelligent  and  capable  clerk,  at  $20.00 
a  week.  Saturday  comes  and  I  get  my  pay,  and,  when 
I  put  that  in  my  pocket,  I  pocket  a  week’s  worth  of 
myself  as  clerk.  Or  I  am  a  merchant,  and  I  have  larger 
affairs;  I  have  the  handling  of  many  clerks  and  require 
a  higher  brain  power  than  that  of  the  ordinary  man.  At 
the  end  of  the  week  I  strike  my  balance  sheet  and  find  I 
am  to  the  good  $1,000.  That  is  a  week’s  worth  of  the 
merchant,  a  higher  grade  of  intelligence.  But  my  name 
is  Edison,  and  I  toil  with  a  brain  of  extraordinary 
power,  and  I  complete  an  invention,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  week  I  sell  the  invention  for  $50,000  and  pocket  the 
check.  That  is  a  week’s  worth  of  the  highest  inventive 
brain  that  there  is.  But  it  is  all  the  same,  anyway. 
The  muscle  man,  the  mind  man,  the  genius,  when  he 
gets  his  money,  is  really  getting  the  result  of  his  own 
labor  in  the  shape  of  cash.”  Money  is  a  paper  or  a 
metal  symbol  of  so  much  energy,  so  much  activity,  so 
much  inventiveness  or  strength. 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY  75 


If  your  money  represents  yourself,  do  you  adminis¬ 
ter  it  so  as  to  show  your  respect  for  yourself  or  do  you 
waste  yourself,  in  your  money  on  unimportant  objects? 

B.  Money  is  a  miracle  because  it  is  stored  power. 

It  is  a  reservoir  of  our  vital  energy  which  can  set  at 
work  doing  anything  we  please.  We  may  go  into  all 
the  world  and  preach  the  gospel  while  we  carry  on,  in 
the  place  where  we  are,  the  everyday  work  which 
God  has  given  us  to  do.  We  can  by  our  money  talk 
in  the  languages  or  dialect  of  every  people  in  every 
place  and  tell  the  men  the  old,  old  story  of  Jesus  and 
His  love,  for  with  our  gifts  we  stand  with,  yea  in,  the 
missionaries  as  they  are  each  day  preaching  in  all 
places.  We  can  in  His  name,  by  our  money,  heal  the 
sick;  give  sight  to  the  blind,  care  for  the  fatherless, 
teach  the  untaught  and  feed  the  hungry.  When  we 
fully  realize  that  our  money  is  ourselves  and  that  where 
our  money  is  there  we  are,  then  our  giving  becomes  an 
“open  sesame”  to  a  glorious  ministry.  And  though  our 
hands  have  never  been  trained  in  the  art  of  surgery, 
by  our  money  we  may  ourselves  in  a  very  real  sense 
operate  in  all  of  the  mission  hospitals  and  dispensaries 
in  the  foreign  and  the  home  fields. 

We  can  by  our  money  become  the  school  teachers  of 
myriads  of  children  in  all  lands  who  are  seeking  to 
learn  in  order  that  they  may  read  the  Bible  and  know 
what  God  is  saying  to  them,  in  the  mission  schools,  on 
the  foreign  fields,  in  the  day  school  for  the  negroes  in 
the  south,  and  in  the  Mission  Sunday  schools  organized 
by  the  Sunday  school  missionaries  as  they  go  hither 
and  yon  to  find  the  lambs  of  the  flock  who  are  without 
the  care  of  the  Good  Shepherd.  No  matter  if  we  our¬ 
selves  are  untaught,  our  money  creates  us  teachers  of 
men,  for  by  money  we  may  transmute  our  daily  toil, 
our  commonplace  routine  work,  the  devoted  duty- 


76 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


doing,  day  by  day,  into  teaching  service  for  God  in 
every  place  whither  the  Church  of  Christ  goes  by  your 
gift  to  minister  in  the  Master’s  name. 

That  is  why  you  young  people  must  take  pains  to 
understand  clearly  the  meaning  of  money  and  your 
stewardship,  and  what  your  money  will  do.  For  you 
will  not  want  to  grow  rich  in  selfishly  acquired  and 
selfishly  saved  and  selfishly  spent  material  wealth,  but 
rich  in  the  vaster  satisfactions  of  the  royal  partnership 
with  God,  as  His  steward,  investing  yourself  by  your 
love,  your  prayer  and  your  giving  in  world  projects 
offering  eternal  dividends. 

It  is  most  difficult  for  us  to  realize  how  much  our 
money  can  do.  Fifteen  young  people  earning  an  aver¬ 
age  wage,  if  they  would  tithe,  could  support  a  foreign 
missionary  at  $1,500  a  year. 

Any  young  man  earning  thirty  dollars  a  week  with 
a  tenth  of  his  salary  could  take  a  hundred  dollar  share 
in  a  Sunday  school  missionary’s  salary  and  still  have 
fifty  dollars  to  give  away  in  other  directions. 

Investing  a  hundred  dollars  in  a  scholarship  for  a 
candidate  for  the  ministry  would  mean  that  you  have 
put  a  hundred  dollars  worth  of  yourself  into  the  preach¬ 
ing  and  labors  of  that  man  for  all  the  years  of  his  min¬ 
istry. 

Our  stewardship  is  the  measure  of  the  genuineness 
of  our  desire  to  give  ourselves  to  Christ.  For  we  can¬ 
not  really  give  ourselves  to  Christ  apart  from  our 
money  which  literally  is  ourselves.  “The  young  clerk 
who  has  $20.00  as  the  result  of  his  week’s  wages,  if 
he  is  wise,  says :  T  have  got  a  week’s  worth  of  myself 
in  my  pocket;  how  shall  I  loose  it?’  One  young  man, 
being  rather  of  an  intellectual  type  of  mind,  goes  up  to 
the  Young  Men’s  Christian  Association,  buys  a  season 
ticket  and  looses  that  much  of  himself  into  the  educa- 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 


77 


tional  courses  of  the  Association ;  that  is,  he  is  pouring 
his  power  back  into  his  brain.  That  is  good.  Another 
young  man  has  a  mother  up  in  the  country,  who  has 
toiled  for  him  while  he  was  a  boy,  and  she  is  now  a 
widow  and  poor.  Saturday  night  he  writes  to  her  and 
says :  ‘I  remember  how  you  toiled  and  sacrificed  for  me 
when  I  was  a  boy.  Enclosed  you  will  find  a  ten-dollar 
bill.  Please  use  it  for  some  extra  comforts  for  your¬ 
self.’  He  is  pouring  a  half-week’s  worth  of  himself 
back  into  his  mother’s  lap.  Blessed  be  that  boy  who 
thus  looses  himself  in  his  old  home  while  he  is  toiling 
in  New  York,  Chicago,  Montreal,  or  New  Orleans. 
Another  young  man  hears  of  the  tremendous  reduction 
in  foreign  missionary  work,  by  reason  of  the  decreased 
liberality  of  the  church  at  home,  and  he  hears  of  some 
teacher  in  India  or  colporteur  in  China  who  can  be 
kept  up  in  his  work  by  a  moderate  gift.  He  makes  up 
his  mind  that  he  would  like  to  loose  a  week’s  worth 
of  himself  in  China.  He  will  never  go  to  China,  but  by 
this  use  of  money  he  can  transplant  a  week’s  or  a  year’s 
worth  of  himself  to  China  and  loose  it  there  for  the 
Kingdom  of  God.  So  he  sends  his  money  to  the  Mis¬ 
sionary  Board.” 

C.  Money  is  a  miracle  in  the  third  place  because 
money  talks  about  those  who  possess  it.  Not  only  can 
money  go  to  every  land  and  talk  in  a  hundred  dialects, 
telling  the  story  of  God’s  love  in  Christ.  But  more 
startling  still,  your  money  talks  about  you.  “Money 
reveals  men.  Money  talks;  it  expresses  what  its  pos¬ 
sessors  actually  are.  The  ordinary  speech  of  men  be¬ 
trays  their  crass  materialism.  As  you  travel  in  a  rail¬ 
way  train,  keep  your  ears  open  and  you  can  soon  catch 
a  vocabulary  in  which  the  words  most  commonly  re¬ 
curring  are  these :  “dollars,”  “share,”  “acres,”  “crops,” 
“houses,”  “automobile,”  and  the  like.  With  metallic 


78 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


click  these  words  ring  from  the  tongue  and  jar  upon  the 
ears  like  cash-registers,  recording  the  thought,  the  true 
tendencies,  of  your  fellow  travelers,  as  they  make  the 
journey  of  life  from  the  station  of  birth  onward  to  the 
final  terminal.  Yes,  money  talks,  and  while  it  is  true 
that  it  is  not  on  speaking  terms  with  every  one,  and  to 
many  it  may  only  say  ‘good-by/  yet  it  speaks  a  various 
language  which  reveals  the  true  inwardness  of  men.” 

Money  is  as  garrulous  as  the  most  gossipy  neighbor. 
Like  a  megaphone,  it  publishes  to  the  world  your 
mercy  or  your  miserliness,  your  righteousness  or  your 
injustice,  your  Christ-likeness  or  your  covetousness. 
It  permits  him  who  runs  to  read  your  preferences : 
whether  in  morals  or  in  dress,  in  religion  or  in  real 
estate.  A  few  years  ago  the  Toronto  Star  printed  the 
following  editorial.  “Yesterday  he  wore  a  rose  on 
the  lapel  of  his  coat,  but  when  the  plate  was  passed 
today  he  gave  a  nickle  to  the  Lord.  He  had  several 
bills  in  his  pocket  and  sundry  change,  perhaps  a  dollars 
worth,  but  he  hunted  about,  and  finding  this  poor  little 
nickle,  he  laid  it  on  the  plate  to  aid  the  Church  militant 
in  its  fight  against  the  world,  the  flesh,  and  the  devil. 
His  silk  hat  was  beneath  the  seat,  and  his  gloves  and 
cane  were  beside  it,  and  the  nickle  was  on  the  plate — 
a  whole  nickle.  On  Saturday  afternoon  he  met  a 
friend,  and  together  they  had  some  refreshments.  The 
cash  register  stamped  seventy-five  cents  on  the  slip 
the  boy  presented  to  him.  Peeling  off  a  bill  he  handed 
it  to  the  lad,  and  gave  him  a  nickle  tip  when  he  brought 
back  the  change.  A  nickle  for  the  Lord  and  a  nickle 
for  the  waiter  !  And  the  man  had  his  shoes  polished 
on  Saturday  afternoon  and  handed  out  a  dime  with¬ 
out  a  murmur.  He  had  a  shave  and  paid  twenty-five 
cents  with  equal  alacrity.  He  took  a  box  of  candies 
home  to  his  wife,  and  paid  one  dollar  and  a  quarter  for 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 


79 


them,  and  the  box  was  tied  with  a  dainty  bit  of  ribbon. 
Yes,  and  he  also  gave  a  nickel  to  the  Lord. 

“Who  is  this  Lord?  Who  is  He?  Why,  the  man 
worships  Him  as  Creator  of  the  universe,  the  one  who 
put  the  stars  in  order,  and  by  whose  immutable  decree 
the  heavens  stand.  Yea,  he  does,  and  he  dropped  a 
nickel  in  to  support  the  Church  militant.  And  what  is 
the  Church  militant?  The  Church  militant  is  the 
Church  that  represents  upon  earth  the  triumphant 
Church  of  the  great  God.  And  the  man  knew  that  he 
was  but  an  atom  in  space,  and  the  Almighty  was  with¬ 
out  limitations.  And  the  Lord  being  gracious,  and 
slow  to  anger,  did  not  slay  the  man  for  the  meanness 
of  his  offering,  but  gives  him  this  day  his  daily  bread.’’ 

What  is  your  money  saying  about  you?  Does  it 
proclaim  you  as  generous  or  stingy?  Does  your  money 
say  you  are  kind-hearted  or  self-seeking?  Money 
talks!  Your  money  is  telling  out  loud  whether  you  are 
a  lover  of  gold  or  servant  of  God,  a  faithful  steward 
or  an  embezzler  of  funds.  What  is  your  money  saying 
about  you? 

Many  people’s  prayers  are  never  heard  in  heaven  be¬ 
cause  their  money  talks  so  loud.  Many  people  cry 
“Lord!  Lord!”  but  their  money  talks  and  Christ  does 
not  heed  their  cry.  When  Jesus  called  Zaccheus  to 
come  down  from  the  tree,  Zaccheus’  money  began  to 
talk  (Luke  19:2-9).  It  was  when  Zaccheus’  money 
talked  that  Jesus  said  unto  him  “Today  is  salvation 
come  to  this  house.”  The  way  some  people’s  money 
talks  keeps  salvation  from  their  house.  Money  talked 
about  three  rich  men  in  the  gospels.  One  was  a  fool 
who  bartered  his  soul  for  barns  and  acres.  One  was 
hard  of  heart  and  blind,  and  saw  neither  God  nor  his 
beggar  brother  at  the  door.  The  third  was  a  coward, 
who  lacked  the  courage  to  leave  his  wealth  and  choose 


80 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


the  higher  good.  (Luke  12:13-21;  Luke  16:19-31; 
Matthew  19:16-26). 

A  man  may  bestow  all  his  goods  to  feed  the  poor, 
but  if  he  has  no  love  it  profiteth  him  nothing.  Even 
when  you  are  generous  your  money  talks  about  mo¬ 
tives.  It  says  love  of  man  or  love  of  display.  (I  Cor¬ 
inthians  13  :3-5). 

D.  Money  is  a  miracle  because  money  may  be  the 
cross  on  which  we  are  to  die.  “If  any  man  will  come 
after  me  let  him  deny  himself  and  take  up  his  cross 
and  follow  me.”  (Matthew  16:24)  Jesus  is  asking  for 
a  real  dying  here  but  not  necessarily  a  physical  dying. 
He  is  asking  for  a  spiritual  act.  He  wants  a  certain 
attitude  of  mind  and  heart.  He  is  not  interested  in  any 
mere  dying  on  a  physical  cross.  He  wants  men  to  die 
on  the  cross  of  their  motives  and  purposes. 

How  can  we  modern  disciples  comply  with  this  de¬ 
mand  of  Christ?  How  can  we  deny  ourselves  and  take 
up  the  cross?  We  can  take  our  money  which  is  our¬ 
selves  and  make  it  the  cross  of  self-sacrificing  service 
on  which  to  die  to  self-profit,  self-ease  and  self-pride. 
When  our  money  is  distributed,  it  is  we  ourselves  who 
are  scattered  abroad.  We  may  die  in  our  money. 
Jesus  said  “For  where  your  treasure  is  there  will  your 
heart  be  also.”  (Matthew  6:21).  Our  money  is  our 
heart  and  to  die  upon  the  cross  by  our  money  is  dying 
to  self  and  living  unto  a  great  ministry.  Giving  some 
portion  of  our  money  is  not  enough,  it  is  the  consecrat¬ 
ing  of  our  whole  income  to  God  alone  which  makes  our 
money  our  cross  on  which  we  die  to  false  ideas  about 

ownership.  This  is  the  secret  of  Christ’s  word,  “He 
that  loseth  his  life  for  my  sake  and  the  gospel’s  shall 
find  it.”  We  give  our  money  (which  is  ourselves),  not 
a  little  part  but  all,  for  the  Christ  enterprise,  in  the 


THE  MIRAQLE  OF  MONEY 


81 


spirit  and  love  of  Christ  and  we  find  the  fullness,  the 
joy,  the  glory  of  his  life  of  sacrifice  and  service. 

E.  This  brings  us  to  the  fifth  miracle  about  money. 
Money  can  be  Christianized.  Increasing  numbers  of 
people  are  accomplishing  this  difficult  task.  Christian 
principles  must  be  applied  in  the  making  of  money  (see 
Study  V)  and  in  the  spending,  saving,  and  investing  of 
money  as  well  as  in  the  giving  of  money.  The  wrong 
attitude  toward  money  in  its  making  as  well  as  in  its 
use  must  be  changed  to  the  Christian  attitude.  Men 
must  be  taught  to  think  straight  in  their  money 
matters.  Money  can  be  made  a  great  Christianizing 
agency  not  only  in  the  missionary  it  supports  but  in 
the  life  of  the  person  making  it  and  disbursing  it  in  ac¬ 
cord  with  Christian  ideals.  One  of  the  greatest  ob¬ 
stacles  standing  in  the  way  of  Christianizing  the  world 
is  the  wrong  attitude  toward  money  on  the  part  of 
Christian  people.  Christianize  the  Christians’  money 
and  it  will  prove  to  be  a  potent  factor  in  winning  the 
world  to  Christ  in  our  day. 

F.  Money  is  a  miracle  because  it  increases  when 
you  give  it  away.  There  is  a  divine  law  in  connection 
with  our  giving.  Christ  with  a  few  loaves  and  fishes  \ 
feeds  thousands.  When  the  woman  of  Zarephath  re¬ 
sponded  to  the  request  of  Elijah,  her  scanty  store  be¬ 
came  a  bountiful  sufficiency.  “But  this  I  say,  He 
which  soweth  sparingly  shall  reap  also  sparingly;  and 
he  which  soweth  bountifully  shall  reap  also  bountifully. 
Every  man  according  as  he  purposeth  in  his  heart,  so 
let  him  give ;  not  grudgingly,  or  of  necessity :  for  God 
loveth  a  cheerful  giver.  And  God  is  able  to  make  all 
grace  abound  toward  you ;  that  ye,  always  having  all 
sufficiency  in  all  things,  may  abound  to  every  good 
work  :  (As  it  is  written,  He  hath  dispersed  abroad  ;  he 
hath  given  to  the  poor:  his  righteousness  remaineth 


82 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


forever.  Now  he  that  ministereth  seed  to  the  sower 
both  minister  bread  for  your  food,  and  multiply  your 
seed  sown,  and  increase  the  fruits  of  your  righteous¬ 
ness  :)  Being  enriched  in  every  thing  to  all  bountiful¬ 
ness,  which  causeth  through  us  thanksgiving  to  God. 
For  the  administration  of  this  service  not  only  sup- 
plieth  the  want  of  the  saints,  but  is  abundant  also  by 
many  thanksgivings  unto  God  ;  while  by  the  experiment 
of  this  ministration  they  glorify  God  for  your  professed 
subjection  unto  the  gospel  of  Christ,  and  for  your  lib¬ 
eral  distribution  unto  them,  and  unto  all  men ;  And  by 
their  prayer  for  you,  which  long  after  you  for  the  ex¬ 
ceeding  grace  of  God  in  you.  Thanks  be  unto  God  for 
his  unspeakable  gift.”  (2  Corinthians  9  :6-16.  See  also 
Proverbs  11:24-26;  22:9;  Galatians  6:7-10). 

Perhaps  you  have  never  thought  of  the  miracle  of 
money  before.  Money  to  you  has  been  more  or  less 
a  prosaic  thing  fraught  with  much  danger  and  not  to 
be  thought  about  very  much  if  you  were  to  be  spirit¬ 
ually  minded,  but  when  you  think  of  money  in  this 
larger  way ;  when  you  see  its  romance ;  when  you  rec¬ 
ognize  that  in  every  truth  your  money  is  your  own  life, 
you,  yourself ;  when  you  realize  how  powerful  it  is — 
the  veritable  miracles  it  can  do ;  when  you  hear  money 
talk ;  when  you  are  told  the  stories  of  those  who  have 
made  their  money  grow  many  fold  in  the  service  of 
Christ,  do  you  not  wish  to  use  yours  differently? 

Many  of  you  readers  without  doubt  are  saying  by 
this  time  “I  want  to  live  as  a  Christian  steward.  1 
must  handle  this  money  of  mine — this  holy  thing — 
with  the  thoughtful  care  of  a  faithful  steward.”  If 
you  are  to  live  as  a  steward  many  of  you  will  want  to 
spend  your  money  very  differently.  You  will  not  be 
willing  to  put  so  much  of  your  life  into  certain  things 
as  you  have  in  the  past.  You  will  want  to  give  your 


THE  MIRAqLE  OF  MONEY 


83 


money  very  differently.  You  will  give  with  more  love 
and  good  will  because  now  you  know  that  all  you  give 
is  you,  your  very  self,  in  the  form  of  money.  Giving 
is  putting  yourself  into  the  object  for  which  the  money 
is  offered.  The  scripture  rules  for  giving  are: — 

Unostentatiously — Matt.  7 :3 

“And  why  beholdest  thou  the  mote  that  is  in  thy 
brother’s  eye,  but  eonsiderest  not  the  beam  that  is  in 
thine  own  eye?” 

Cheerfully — 2  Cor.  9 :7 

“Every  man  according  as  he  purposeth  in  his  heart, 
so  let  him  give ;  not  grudgingly,  or  of  necessity :  for 
God  loveth  a  cheerful  giver.” 

Liberally — Prov.  11:25 

“The  liberal  soul  shall  be  made  fat :  and  he  that 
watereth  shall  be  watered  also  himself.” 

Systematically — 1  Cor.  16 :2 

“Upon  the  first  day  of  the  week  let  every  one  of  you 
lay  by  him  in  store.” 

Proportionately — 1  Cor.  16 :2 

“Upon  the  first  day  of  the  week  let  every  one  of  you 
lay  by  him  in  store,  as  God  hath  prospered  him,  that 
there  be  no  gatherings  when  I  come.” 

Sacrificially — 2  Sam.  24:24 

“And  the  King  said  unto  Araunah,  Nay;  but  I  will 
surely  buy  it  of  thee  at  a  price;  neither  will  I  offer 
burnt  offerings  unto  the  Lord  my  God  of  that  which 
doth  cost  me  nothing.  So  David  bought  the  thresh¬ 
ing  floor  and  the  oxen  for  fifty  shekels  of  silver.” 

The  practice  of  stewardship  in  your  money  should 
help  you  to  the  practice  of  the  stewardship  of  your 
whole  life. 

This  long  study  .on  money  must  not  leave  the  im¬ 
pression  that  after  all  money  is  the  all  of  stewardship 


84 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


or  even  the  most  important  phase  of  it.  The  author 
has  endeavored  to  avoid  the  danger  of  being  under¬ 
stood  to  teach  that  the  stewardship  of  money  is  all 
there  is  to  stewardship.  Constantly  in  these  studies 
effort  has  been  made  to  deepen  the  realization  that  all 
life  is  a  stewardship. 

We  are  stewards  of  our  time,  our  prayer  life,  our 
artistic  talent,  our  literary  ability,  our  personality.  All 
things  we  are  as  well  as  all  things  we  possess  are  a 
trust,  to  be  used  not  merely  for  ourselves  as  if  they  were 
our  own  but  for  others  as  God  may  direct.  It  is  not  de¬ 
sired  that  this  study  on  money  should  obscure  in  the 
least  degree  the  full  stewardship  of  life  in  all  its  ele¬ 
ments.  And  just  as  we  think  of  money  as  ourselves, 
something  into  which  we  have  put  a  certain  part  of 
our  time,  our  strength,  our  skill,  our  talent,  our  special 
gifts,  so  we  ought  to  think  of  our  work,  be  it  business  or 
law  or  medicine  or  art  or  literary  work,  as  just  so  much 
of  ourselves.  The  things  we  produce  in  our  work  are 
ourselves,  fabricated  in  various  forms.  And  just  as 
we  set  apart  a  definite  portion  of  our  money  as  a  re¬ 
minder  and  pledge  of  our  acceptance  of  God’s  owner¬ 
ship  of  all  our  money,  so  too  we  have  set  aside  for 
special  kingdom  service  in  the  church  and  elsewhere, 
a  separated  portion  of  our  lives  in  all  these  various 
elements — our  time,  our  special  skill,  our  particular 
capacity — to  remind  us  of  God’s  entire  ownership  of 
us,  in  every  single  phase  of  our  lives. 

Some  of  you  may  be  saying  “I  understand  that  my 
stewardship  covers  all  I  am  as  well  as  what  I  possess. 
I  realize  now  that  money  is  not  the  whole  of  steward¬ 
ship  nor  even  the  most  important  phase  of  it.  I  intend 
to  be  an  honest  and  faithful  steward  of  my  time  and 
talents  and  personal  influence  but  somehow  I  feel  I 
can  begin  most  tangibly  with  my  money.  I  want  to 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 


85 


know  ‘How  can  I  begin  to  practice  stewardship  in  my 
money  matters?’”  The  answer  to  these  questions  of 
yours  is  a  very  simple  one.  Acknowledge  your  stew¬ 
ardship  by  at  once  setting  aside  for  giving,  some 
definite  proportion  of  your  net  income  (it  should 
not  be  generally  less  than  one  tenth).  You  will  then 
spend  or  save  the  rest  remembering  that  God  owns  it 
as  well  as  the  separated  portion.  (See  again  study  II) 

A  revival  of  Stewardship  practice  as  we  have  dis¬ 
cussed  it  will  lift  the  church  to  new  levels  of  spiritual 
life  and  power.  “Stewardship  recognizes  the  great 
gulf  that  exists  between  the  benevolent  paganism 
which  calls  itself  Christian  liberality  and  the  spirit  of 
Christian  stewardship  which  recognizes  God  as  Owner 
of  all.  The  former  gives  God  a  bit  of  loose  change  now 
and  again !  The  latter  regards  every  Christian  as  a 
steward  administering  the  affairs  of  his  supreme  Part¬ 
ner  for  the  benefit  of  those  for  whom  he  is  responsible, 
for  the  benefit  of  the  church  and  for  the  needs  of  hu¬ 
manity.”  The  next  great  step  for  the  church  in  girding 
itself  for  more  adequate  world  service  is  the  recogni¬ 
tion  and  practice  of  that  view  of  life  we  call  “steward¬ 
ship” — making  every  activity  and  resource  serve  in 
the  carrying  out  of  a  Christian  program  of  world  sal¬ 
vation,  not  only  providing  adequate  quotas  of  men  and 
money,  but  conducting  the  whole  enterprise  of  life — 
business,  education,  art — not  on  a  selfish,  competitive 
basis,  but  on  the  stewardship  basis  of  responsibility 
to  God  and  service  to  man. 

To  summarize  this  study  may  we  say  again  our 
money  is  not  “filthy  lucre”  if  we  recognize  what  it  is 
and  what  it  will  do.  Our  money  is  ourselves.  It  is  our 
very  life,  our  daily  work,  our  time  and  strength  and 
skill,  our  very  life  blood  minted  into  coin.  When  we 
hold  our  money  in  our  hands  we  are  holding  so  many 


86 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


minutes  and  hours  and  days  of  our  life,  just  so  much  of 
our  vital  force  as  has  been  expended  in  its  acquisition, 
so  much  of  our  toil  and  time.  When  we  give  we  are 
literally  giving  our  life  for  our  fellowmen,  to  help  to 
heal  and  to  save  them.  Giving  is  in  reality  the  laying 
down  our  lives  for  the  brethren — losing  our  lives  for 
Christ’s  sake  that  we  may  find  them  in  a  larger  fellow¬ 
ship  with  God  and  in  the  fuller  joy  of  our  Partnership 
with  Christ  in  the  world’s  redemption.  As  we  thus 
realize  that  our  money  giving  is  self  giving,  our  stew¬ 
ardship  merges  into  a  glorious  partnership  not  only 
only  with  Christ  but  also  with  all  those  who  in  any 
way  are  at  work  forwarding  the  Kingdom. 

Are  you  now  prepared  to  accept  the  principles  of 
stewardship  and  sign  the  pledge  enrolling  you  in  the 
Fellowship  of  Stewardship?  The  principles  are: — 

I  Believe 

That  God  is  owner  of  all. 

That  I  am  his  steward  and  must  account  for  all  that 
I  have. 

That  God  requires  me  to  give  a  definite  proportion 
of  my  income  for  his  service,  in  acknowledgment  of 
his  ownership  and  of  my  stewardship. 

That  I  should  use  all  the  rest — what  I  spend  and 
what  I  save — in  ways  that  are  pleasing  to  God. 

Have  you  enrolled  ? 

Will  you  begin  by  setting  apart  a  Separated  Portion 
and  so  witness  the  fact  that  you  recognize  God’s 
ownership  of  all  you  are  and  possess? 

Will  you  sign  this  statement: 

“IN  LOVING  LOYALTY  TO  MY  LORD,  I 
WILL  SET  APART  AT  LEAST  A  TENTH  OF  MY 
NET  INCOME  TO  GIVE  FOR  HIS  SERVICE.” 


Signed 


THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 


87 


The  slogan  used  by  the  Y.  M.  C.  A.  in  National 
Thrift  Week  last  year  provides  a  final  word  that  we  all 
should  think  about :  “Master  Money  Matters  or  They 
Will  Master  You.” 

Shall  we,  as  its  master,  use  our  money  to  do  the 
miraculous  for  ourselves  and  for  Christ  or  will  we  let 
our  money  master  us  and  make  us  selfish,  miserly, 
covetous,  grasping  and  forgetful  of  God? 

Stewardship  alone  can  save  you  from  your  money. 

QUESTIONS  ON  STUDY  IV 
THE  MIRACLE  OF  MONEY 

1.  Do  you  think  that  money  is  the  most  talked-of 
topic  in  the  Bible?  Why  do  you  suppose  all  this  em¬ 
phasis  is  laid  upon  money?  What  is  the  spiritual  pur¬ 
pose  working  in  material  things? 

2.  What  vices  grow  out  of  an  abuse  of  money?  Quote 
Bible  texts  dealing  with  the  dangers  of  wealth. 

3.  Name  and  illustrate  five  ways  in  which  money, 
properly  used,  is  a  miracle. 

4.  The  old  adage  runs,  “Money  talks.”  Tell  some  of 
the  things  money  may  say  about  us. 

5.  “Money  can  be  Christianized.”  What  does  this 
mean?  Are  you  Christianizing  your  money? 

6.  What  difference  does  this  Stewardship  view  of 
money  make  to  you  in  the  handling  of  your  money? 

7.  What  are  the  scripture  rules  for  the  giving  of 
money?  Memorize  texts. 

8.  Since  Stewardship  covers  all  phases  of  human  life, 
why  should  we  make  money  the  basis  for  our  discus¬ 
sion  on  Stewardship? 


“Money  makes  the  man  while  the  man 
is  making  the  money.” 

David  McConaughy 


STUDY  V 

BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  BUSINESS 

FOR  SERVICE 

N  the  first  four  studies,  we  have  con¬ 
sidered  stewardship  from  the  angle  of 
our  possessions — the  things  we  have  al¬ 
ready  acquired.  We  have  been  answer¬ 
ing  the  question,  “How  must  the  Christ- 
use  the  things  he  has?”  We  have  more 
particularly  stressed  our  stewardship  of  giving.  We 
did  this  not  because  we  deemed  this  the  most  impor¬ 
tant  fact  about  stewardship  but  because  we  wanted 
to  tie  up  your  decision  about  stewardship  to  the  very 
concrete  facts  of  money. 

In  this  study  (Study  V)  we  shall  present  the  teach¬ 
ing  of  the  Bible  concerning  the  acquisition  of  wealth. 
What  has  stewardship  to  say  about  the  spirit,  motive 
and  objectives  of  acquisition?  The  principles  of 
Christian  stewardship  in  relation  to  acquisition  apply 
not  only  to  the  getting  of  money  but  to  the  acquiring  of 
an  education,  the  development  of  an  artistic  talent,  the 
securing  of  leisure,  the  gaining  of  a  position  of  privilege 
and  influence,  the  making  of  a  personality,  in  other 
words  to  the  acquisition  of  everything  we  own.  The 
spirit  and  motive  and  method  and  purpose  in  acquiring 
these  possessions  must  be  kept  Christian  and  social 
just  as  much  as  must  money  making.  It  will  be  well  to 
illustrate  by  an  example  or  two  how  stewardship  bears 


ian  steward 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  89 


on  these  other  phases  of  life.  For  example,  the  acquisi¬ 
tion  of  an  education  may  be  a  very  selfish  process  with 
a  most  unsocial  goal  in  view.  To  become  intellectually 
developed  with  no  ambition  to  use  one’s  education  for 
the  enrichment  of  the  life  of  the  race,  to  keep  acquiring 
knowledge  and  refusing  to  use  it  to  do  good,  is  as 
despicable  as  the  miserly  hoarding  of  money.  There  is 
an  intolerable  arrogance  of  an  intellectual  snobbery 
which  can  have  no  place  in  the  life  of  a  Christian 
steward. 

In  the  same  way,  stewardship  obligations  accom¬ 
pany  the  acquisition  of  artistic  and  musical  skill.  The 
talent  originally  came  from  God.  It  is  under  his  bless¬ 
ing  that  its  development  takes  place.  Shall  it  be  with 
humble  and  thankful  spirit  that  we  recognize  that  this 
God-imparted  gift  is  not  ours  to  exploit  for  selfish 
gains  or  our  own  pleasure?  God  intended  that  as  good 
stewards  we  should  administer  this  talent  for  the  bless¬ 
ing  and  enrichment  of  all  mankind.  Musicians  may 
take  pay,  but  theirs  is  not  the  spirit  of  Christian  stew¬ 
ardship  if  they  perform  merely  for  money  and  forget 
that  the  gift’s  from  God  for  all  mankind.  The  artist, 
the  teacher,  the  physician,  the  lawyer,  and  the  busi¬ 
ness  man  must  face  their  work  not  with  the  purpose  to 
see  how  much  can  be  gotten  out  of  it  for  themselves  but 
to  see  how  much  service  may  be  offered  to  humanity. 
They  must  work  in  the  spirit  of  one  teacher  who  faces 
his  work  and  says,  “My  university  pays  me  for  doing 
what  I  would  gladly  pay  for  the  privilege  of  doing  if  I 
could  only  afford  it.”  The  stewardship  attitude  is  the 
attitude  of  Eliot’s  Stradivari  when  he  conceived  his 
task  of  making  violins  not  as  a  money-making  oppor¬ 
tunity  but  as  a  partnership  with  God,  who  he  says 


90 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


.  .  .  /‘Could  not  make 
Antonio  Stradivari’s  violins 
Without  Antonio....” 

The  student  will  wish  to  add  other  illustrations 
showing  how  all  acquisition,  no  matter  in  what  sphere, 
must  be  directed  by  stewardship  ideals.  Expand  this 
thought  in  connection  with  the  lawyer,  the  doctor,  the 
teacher,  the  scientist. 

In  order  to  discuss  the  Bible  teachings  on  the  stew¬ 
ardship  of  acquiring,  we  shall  as  heretofore  discuss  it 
and  make  our  applications  in  relation  to  money,  though 
as  we  have  all  along  pointed  out  it  is  to  be  remembered 
that  this  is  only  one  sphere  in  which  these  principles 
should  prevail. 

Stewardship  is  often  discussed  as  if  it  began  after  a 
man  had  acquired  something.  When  he  has  made 
money  and  is  ready  to  use  it  then  he  must  manage  its 
use  according  to  stewardship  principles. 

But  the  Bible  begins  at  the  beginning  in  its  teachings 
about  stewardship — It  has  something  to  say  about  how 
and  the  why  of  money  making  as  well  as  its  giving  and 
saving. 

Giving  is  not  the  first  thing  in  stewardship  but  the 
last.  It  is  in  connection  with  the  acquisition  of  prop¬ 
erty,  with  the  making  of  money,  that  the  application 
of  stewardship  begins.  Those  whose  income  of  wages 
or  profits  is  small  are  just  as  responsible  as  Christian 
stewards,  as  those  who  have  great  wealth,  both  in  the 
use  of  what  they  possess  and  in  its  acquisition.  Men 
acquire  wealth  by  God’s  help.  It  is  God  who  gives  us 
the  power  to  get  wealth  (Deuteronomy  8:18).  The 
farmer  may  plow  the  field  and  sow  the  seed  but  how 
impossible  for  him  to  reap  without  the  sun  and  the 
rain.  Paul  may  plant,  Apollos  may  water,  but  God 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  9 1 


giveth  the  increase.  (1  Cor.  3:6)  Who  provides  the 
miner,  the  lumberman,  the  steel  factory,  the  cotton 
mills  with  their  raw  materials?  Men  cannot  acquire 
or  hold  anything  except  by  the  will  of  God. 

The  steward  is  responsible  for  all  faculties  God  lias 
endowed  him  with.  God  gives  us  various  talents,  the 
talent  of  teaching,  literary  and  artistic  talent,  the  talent 
for  friendship,  and  it  is  God  who  gives  the  talent  for 
finances.  Every  talent  constitutes  a  stewardship  to 
which  every  principle  which  we  shall  develop  in  con¬ 
nection  with  this  study  of  the  Bible  teaching  concern¬ 
ing  the  acquiring  of  money  shall  be  applied.  To  neg¬ 
lect  to  use  this  money-making  endowment  or  to  use  it 
for  self  alone,  is  to  be  condemned.  The  servant  who 
hid  the  pound  in  a  napkin  was  condemned  because  he 
did  not  make  any  return  to  his  master.  (Luke 
19:13-26)  We  are  responsible  to  God  for  what  he  be¬ 
stows  upon  us.  We  must  use  every  gift  of  God  for  the 
blessing  of  man.  The  gift  of  money-making  must  be 
used  with  all  diligence.  “It  is  the  duty  of  some  men 
to  make  a  great  deal  of  money.  God  has  given  to 
them  the  money-making  talent,  and  it  is  as  wrong 
to  bury  that  talent  as  to  bury  the  talent  for  preaching. 
Whatever  their  occupation,  Christians  have  but  one 
business  in  the  world,  viz.,  the  extending  of  Christ’s 
kingdom :  and  merchant,  mechanic,  baker,  musician, 
artist,  teacher,  lawyer  and  doctor  are  under  exactly  the 
same  obligations  to  be  wholly  consecrated  to  that  work 
as  is  the  missionary.”  ‘  (Josiah  Strong). 

God  takes  account  of  the  spirit  and  method  of  ac¬ 
quisition.  He  said  to  the  rich  whose  riches  were  ob¬ 
tained  unjustly,  “Your  gold  and  your  silver  are  rusted 
and  their  rust  shall  be  testimony  against  you,  and  shall 
eat  your  flesh  as  it  were  fire.  Ye  have  heaped  treasure 
together  for  the  last  days.  Behold,  the  hire  of  the 


92 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


labourers  who  have  reaped  down  your  fields  which 
is  of  you  kept  back  by  fraud,  crieth :  and  the  cries  of 
them  which  have  reaped  are  entered  into  the  ears  of 
the  Lord  of  Sabaoth.”  (James  5  :5)  Read  also  Isiaah 
3:14-15;  Ezekiel  22:29;  Amos  2:6.  The  giving  of 
money  is  clearly  a  stewardship  but  the  making  of 
money  is  still  more  clearly  a  stewardship. 

A  second  thing  taught  in  the  Bible  concerning  stew¬ 
ardship  in  relation  to  the  getting  of  wealth  is  that 
Christian  men  in  their  business  relations  should  count 
themselves  to  be  partners  with  God.  God  does  not 
always  call  men  to  give  up  business  in  order  that  they 
may  serve  him  but  he  calls  many  men  to  serve  him  in 
their  business  and  by  their  business  as  Christian  stew¬ 
ards.  Jesus  said,  “I  pray  not  that  thou  shouldest  take 
them  out  of  the  world.”  (John  17  :15)  “As  thou  hast 
sent  me  into  the  world  even  so  have  I  also  sent  them 
into  the  world.”  (John  17 :18)  It  is  out  in  the  world — 
the  workaday  world — that  the  disciples  of  Christ  are  to 
bring  the  kingdom  in  by  each  one,  artist,  farmer,  teach¬ 
er,  merchant  doing  in  every  place  his  own  work 
whatever  that  may  be, — in  the  spirit  of  Christian  stew¬ 
ardship — as  a  partnership  writh  God. 

Christ  is  to  subdue  all  things,  even  the  selfishness, 
the  desperate  competition  and  every  other  ill  of  the  in¬ 
dustrial  business  world.  “Let  each  man  wherein  he 
was  called  therein  abide  with  God.”  (I  Cor.  7:24). 
No  Christian  man  can  say,  “When  I  am  more  free 
from  the  pressure  of  business  I  mean  to  give  more  time 
to  the  service  of  God.  Then  I  will  have  more  time  for 
Christian  work.”  The  Christian  steward  must  say  with 
his  Lord,  “My  meat  is  to  do  the  will  of  Him  that  sent 
me  and  to  finish  his  work,”  (John  4:34),  in  faithfully 
performing  my  stewardship  in  my  own  business,  or 
my  own  job.  He  will  not  look  upon  his  daily  work  or 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  93 


business  as  an  interlude  between  times  of  Christian 
service  when  he  may  chance  be  praying  or  doing  defi¬ 
nite  religious  work.  He  will  count  his  business  a  stew¬ 
ardship.  The  saying  of  William  Carey,  “My  business 
is  to  preach  the  gospel  and  I  cobble  shoes  to  pay  ex¬ 
penses,”  expresses  a  praise-worthy  spirit  of  devotion 
but  it  does  not  altogether  express  the  full  richness  of 
the  New  Testament  conception  of  life.  The  cobler 
who  is  a  Christian  steward  will  rather  say,  “I  must 
preach  Christ  and  I  will  do  so  in  every  way  I  can,  us¬ 
ing  as  much  of  my  money  as  I  can  but  especially 
shall  my  work  of  cobbling  shoes  preach  him.”  We 
must  Christianize  our  vocation.  In  all  things,  in  bus¬ 
iness,  in  trade,  in  the  workshop,  in  the  concert  hall,  in 
the  studio,  in  the  library,  in  our  school  work,  in  the 
kitchen,  or  the  playground  we  must  definitely  give 
Christ  the  preeminence.  (Colossians  1  18).  These 
stewardship  princples  in  business  and  in  all  work 
must  not  be  merely  a  pious  ideal,  they  must  be  ac¬ 
tually,  rigidly  applied.  (I  Cor.  10:31) 

A  third  Bible  teaching  on  this  matter  of  the  steward¬ 
ship  of  acquiring  wealth  is  that  business  and  every 
other  form  of  service  must  be  counted  a  holy  calling. 

The  miner,  the  doctor,  the  lumber  jack,  the  teacher,  the 
railroad  man,  the  editor,  the  poet,  the  musician,  all 
these  must  be  esteemed  the  servants  of  the  most  High 
God.  In  the  past  we  have  thought  of  the  minister  and 
missionary  as  having  the  only  real  chance  to  be  stew¬ 
ards.  But  why  should  not  business  and  teaching  and 
medicine  and  law  and  art  be  counted  as  divine  callings 
as  well  ? 

The  Christian  steward  conceives  his  work  as  a  holy 
calling.  “A  Christian  man’s  place  of  business  ought  to 
be  as  sacred  to  him  as  any  place  of  prayer.  It  ought  to 
be  a  place  of  prayer.  His  business  ought  to  be  to  him 


94 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


as  really  a  divine  calling,  as  is  the  work  of  the  Christian 
minister  or  missionary  to  the  men  who  are  ordained 
for  those  spheres  of  service.  No  man’s  life  is  going  to 
count  for  much  for  the  good  of  the  world  that  is  not 
possessed  by  a  sense  of  a  divine  calling  and  mission. 
We  have  made  a  great  mistake  when  we  have  divided 
our  life  and  called  this  part  secular  and  that  religious. 
It  is  all  religious.  We  are  always  stewards.” 

Because  we  are  using  the  acquisition  of  money  as 
the  basis  of  our  consideration  of  stewardship,  we  es¬ 
pecially  stress  the  fact  of  the  divinity  of  trade  and 
commerce  and  manufactures.  Are  not  trade  and  manu¬ 
facturing  great  ministering  agencies?  How  could  the 
world  be  clothed  and  fed  in  this  time  of  complex  liv¬ 
ing  unless  men  produced  and  made  available  the  sup¬ 
plies  needed  for  this  purpose.  ?  Is  not  feeding  the 
hungry  and  clothing  the  naked  a  Christian  service  ? 
But  you  say  men  in  business  do  it  for  profit,  they  make 
money  on  the  hunger  and  need  of  people.  The  answer 
is,  business  when  it  is  a  stewardship  will  not  be  mo¬ 
tived  by  the  profit  stimulus,  it  will  be  counted  a  service 
for  God  and  man.  Profits  may  still  come  in,  for  stew¬ 
ardship  does  not  abolish  profits  but  the  profit  motive. 
Stewardship  not  only  requires  that  all  money  and 
wealth  be  acquired  honestly  and  justly,  it  requires 
vastly  more  fhan  these,  as  important  as  these  are. 
Stewardship  in  making  money  requires : 

(1)  That  a  Christian  steward  should  never  plan  to 
get  rich  for  himself,  merely  in  order  that  he  may  have 
abundance.  He  must  make  money  in  order  to  build 
the  kingdom.  (I  Timothy  6:9-12). 

(2)  That  a  Christian  steward  should  never  seek 
the  possession  of  money  in  order  to  live  at  ease  or  in 
luxury  or  to  make  it  unnecessary  for  his  children  to 
work.  The  true  objective  in  life  is  not  ease  but  en- 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  95 


larged  self  giving.  (Mark  13:34;  Luke  16:19  seq.) 

(3)  That  the  Christian  Steward  shall  have  as  his 
first  concern — service,  whether  he  be  a  worker  on 
salary  or  an  owner  of  a  business.  His  work  can  never 
be  for  profit  or  a  wage  primarily.  It  must  be  to  serve. 
(Luke  12:16  seq.;  Luke  16:13;  Luke  12:15). 

(4)  That  the  Christian  steward  should  not  acquire 
wealth  by  the  degradation  of  manhood  or  womanhood. 
Money  made  on  the  blood  of  the  workers  can  never  be 
possessed  by  Christian  stewards.  “He  that  oppresseth 
the  poor  reproacheth  his  Maker.”  (Proverbs  14:31) 
See  also  Proverbs  21:13;  Ecclesiastes  5:8-16;  Jeremiah 
22:13-17. 

In  the  fourth  place  the  Bible  makes  it  plain  that  trade 
and  industry  must  become  a  stewardship  before  the 
world  can  be  redeemed.  Until  God  becomes  a  very 
real  and  controlling  Partner  in  the  affairs  of  business 
and  industry,  how  can  life  come  under  the  sway  of 
Jesus  Christ  ?  Think  of  how  much  of  the  time  of  a  man 
is  consumed  in  business  and  trade  activities.  How  can 
we  hope  to  build  a  Christian  social  order  without 
putting  God  into  business?  Think  of  how  many  of 
the  sins  of  men  are  connected  with  the  making  of 
money.  Name  some  of  the  social  sins  growing  out  of 
the  love  of  money.  Christian  men  must  set  themselves 
the  task  of  bringing  Christ  into  all  business  and  how 
desperately  God  is  needed  in  this  area  of  man’s  life. 
“It  is  well  that  men  of  business  give  of  their  profits  to 
God.  It  is  splendid  to  hear  of  a  man  who  definitely  sets 
himself  to  make  money  for  God.  But  there  is  a  still 
higher  ideal  and  that  is  so  to  organize  and  conduct  in¬ 
dustry  that  it  shall  express  the  righteousness  of  God 
and  the  brotherhood  of  man. 

In  an  article  in  “The  Century,”  one  of  its  editors 
said,  “I  could  name  twenty  leaders  of  American  busi- 


96 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


ness  and  industry  who  at  this  moment  hold  it  within 
their  power  to  determine  the  course  of  industrial  rela¬ 
tions  in  their  country  for  the  next  twenty-five  years. 
Twenty  men  who  could  change  selfish  competition  into 
large-visioned  cooperation,  twenty  men  who  might 
bring  democracy  and  justice  into  industry.”  If  this  be 
true,  what  would  occur  if  every  Christian  in  business 
and  in  trade  definitely  counted  his  business  skill  and  his 
business  influence  and  his  business  position  as  a  Christ¬ 
ian  stewardship  to  be  administered,  not  as  a  means  of 
making  money  but  as  God-bestowed  talents  to  be  used 
in  turning  the  whole  world  of  business  and  industry  in 
all  their  phases  into  a  great  service  for  humanity.  That 
would  be  Christian  service  more  far-reaching  in  its 
significance  than  any  work  of  minister  or  missionary 
and  many  times  more  potent  for  the  bringing  in  of 
the  Kingdom  than  gifts  of  countless  millions. 

Do  you  think  the  following  text  can  rightfully  be 
used  as  enjoining  this  kind  of  Christian  stewardship  in 
business?  “Study  to  show  thyself  approved  unto  God, 
a  workman  that  needeth  not  to  be  ashamed,  rightly 
dividing  the  word  of  truth.”  ( 2  Timothy  2  :15)  Does 
“rightly  dividing  the  word”  mean  only  “preaching”  the 
word  in  conformity  with  traditional  truth?  May 
“rightly  dividing  the  word”  be  interpreted  to  mean 
“rightly  applying  the  word”  to  every  day  life?  Can  the 
“word  of  truth”  be  “rightly  divided”  if  it  is  not  prac¬ 
ticed  in  business  and  industry?  (See  2  Corinthians 
3  :2,  3  ;  2  Thessalonians  2  :8-14)  The  major  part  of  our 
money  stewardship  must  be  discharged  in  establishing 
the  Christian  ideal  in  our  business  enterprises.  The 
proper  using  of  money  is  a  very  real  and  vital  part  of 
our  stewardship  but  only  a  small  fraction  of  our  total 
stewardship.  It  is  not  so  much  as  a  giver  but  as  a  busi¬ 
ness  man  that  your  acceptance  and  practice  of  the  stew- 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  97 


ardship  principles  are  to  count  most  for  the  Kingdom 
of  God.  The  managing  of  your  business  is  to  have 
the  most  influential  results  for  the  Kingdom  of  God. 
“The  call  of  the  hour  is  to  the  business  men  to  serve 
God  in  their  business  and  by  their  business.  God 
needs  men  who  will  be  faithful  stewards  of  the  manifold 
grace  of  God  by  being  faithful  stewards  for  him  in  the 
acquisition  of  wealth.  Especially  to  the  young  man 
and  young  woman  does  this  call  come.  It  is  far  easier 
to  adjust  one’s  business  career  to  the  great  business  of 
the  Kingdom  of  God  when  life’s  duties  and  responsibil¬ 
ities  are  being  assumed,  and  life’s  activities  are  being 
entered  upon  than  at  any  time  afterwards.”  (Cook — 
Stewardship  and  Missions)  The  radical  changes  which 
must  be  wrought  in  the  industrial  and  business  worlds, 
so  that  they  shall  express  more  adequately  the  spirit 
and  mind  of  Christ,  will  be  made  not  by  the  old  men 
but  by  the  young  men  and  young  women.  They  are 
life’s  dreamers  and  idealists.  (See  Joel  2  :28,  29). 

The  skill  and  talent  in  trade  and  work  possessed  by 
Christian  stewards,  the  main  use  of  which  is  to  be  in 
the  field  of  industry  and  trade,  has  however,  a  very 
heavy  responsibility  for  the  proper  conduct  of  the 
church  and  other  Kingdom  enterprises.  Christian 
stewards  must  not  be  so  absorbed  in  business  as  to  have 
no  definite  periods  of  time  and  segments  of  strength 
and  skill  for  use  in  the  more  direct  work  of  the  King¬ 
dom  of  God.  Here  again  in  recognition  of  God’s  claims 
to  all  we  are  under  obligation  to  set  aside  a  separated 
portion  of  our  life  in  every  phase  as  definitely  God’s 
and  to  be  employed  as  He  may  appoint. 

A  slogan  was  used  in  one  of  the  missionary  move¬ 
ments  which  condenses  into  a  memorizable  form,  the 
call  for  Christian  stewardship  in  the  business  world. 
The  sentence  was  “Rearrange  your  life  activities  in  the 


98 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


light  of  the  great  commission.”  “When  men  see  that 
they  may  work  in  behalf  of  the  Kingdom  by  the  way 
they  run  their  factories,  make  laws,  edit  newspapers, 
pay  wages,  mine  coal,  plow  fields,  a  great  change  will 
come  over  the  life  and  thought  of  the  world.  The  me¬ 
chanic  may  be  as  necessary  to  the  coming  of  the  King¬ 
dom  of  God  as  the  preacher;  and  the  merchant  may  yet 
play  as  important  a  part  as  the  missionary.”  (S.  Z. 
Batten)  And  the  needed  resources  of  time  and  person¬ 
ality  and  directing  intelligence,  as  well  as  money  for 
the  work  of  the  church  and  the  other  great  interests  of 
the  Kingdom,  will  be  forthcoming  because  men  recog¬ 
nizing  their  stewardship  of  all  life  will  acknowledge  it 
by  setting  aside  the  separated  portions  from  all  God’s 
gifts  to  them.  Nothing  that  has  been  said  must  be 
deemed  to  mean  that  God  does  not  call  some  into  full 
time  service  as  ministers  and  missionaries.  We  must 
each  one  ask  “Lord  what  will  thou  have  me  to  do  ?” 
If  hie  calls  to  full  time  work  we  must  say,  “Lord,  Here 
am  I,  send  me  !”  If  God  calls  to  full  time  work  noth¬ 
ing  else  will  suffice  though  we  carry  on  business  on 
ever  so  Christian  a  scale.  But  on  the  other  hand  if 
God  trusts  us  out  into  the  fields  of  business  which  are 
white  to  the  harvest,  we  must  count  that  a  call  to  a 
holy  service  just  as  much  as  if  we  were  called  to  full 
time  service  in  the  church. 

The  fifth  teaching  of  the  Bible  concerning  the  stew¬ 
ardship  of  acquisition  is  that  every  Christian  must  be  a 
producer  of  values.  He  must  be  a  worker.  Jesus  said, 
“My  Father  worketh  hitherto  and  I  work.”  (John 
5:17)  See  also  John  17:4;  1  Thessalonians  4:11,  12; 
Revelation  22:10-12).  Paul  said,  “If  any  would  not 
work,  neither  should  he  eat.”  (2  Thessalonians  3  :10) 
In  Genesis  we  are  admonished  to  eat  our  bread  in  the 
sweat  of  our  brow  and  in  Exodus  we  are  commanded 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  99 


to  labor  six  days  of  the  week.  Dr.  Rauschenbusch 
says,  “When  a  man  gets  outside  the  common  work  of 
mankind  he  gets  outside  the  Kingdom  of  God.”  The 
Christian  steward  will  put  his  maximum  energy  into 
his  job,  whatever  it  may  be,  so  long  as  it  is  genuine 
work,  producing  needed  values  for  the  use  of  mankind. 
No  duty  in  all  the  realm  of  daily  toil  is  too  humble  to  be 
done  without  a  sense  of  serving  God.  “Whether  there¬ 
fore  we  eat  or  drink  or  whatsoever  we  do,  we  are  to  do 
all  to  the  glory  of  God.”  (1  Cor.  10:31.)  This  means 
that  the  Christian  steward  can  be  engaged  in  only  such 
business  enterprises  as  do  mankind  a  service  and  not  a 
disservice.  He  cannot  make  money  in  a  concern  which 
is  producing  and  selling  things  which  are  harmful  to 
society.  He  will  count  himself  a  Partner  with  God  in 
providing  for  the  needs  of  mankind.  This  spirit  of 
stewardship  will  close  many  of  the  “middleman  oc¬ 
cupations”  to  the  Christian  steward  on  the  ground  that 
they  are  non-value-producing  activities.  Discuss  var¬ 
ious  forms  of  work  and  business  which  might  be  ques¬ 
tioned  from  the  standpoint  of  Christian  stewardship. 

|What  do  you  think  should  be  the  Christian  stew¬ 
ards  attitude  in  the  matter  of  the  production  and  sale  of 
nonessentials  and  luxuries,  while  the  very  necessities  of 
life  are  still  insufficient  to  meet  the  needs  of  humanity? 
(This  requires  that  a  discrimination  be  made  as  to 
what  constitutes  a  luxury  as  contrasted  with  a  neces¬ 
sity).  The  following  definitions  are  given  in  “Money, 
the  Acid  Test.”  Consult  your  dictionaries  also. 

A  necessity  is  something  indispensable  to  well 
being. 

A  convenience  is  something  that  though  not  essen¬ 
tial  makes  living  easier. 

A  comfort  is  something  that  brings  satisfaction 
without  extraordinary  expense. 


100 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


A  luxury  is  something  that  affords  self-gratification 
in  an  unusual  and  costly  manner. 

Consider  the  cases  of  different  individuals  in  the 
matter  of  travel. 

A — whose  time  is  ample  and  his  labor  cheap — 
walks. 

B — having  less  time  and  more  profitable  labor — 
takes  a  trolley  car. 

C — being  in  great  demand,  hires  a  taxicab. 

D — hard  pressed  for  time,  keeps  his  own  automobile. 

Could  it  be  called  a  waste  for  D  to  ride  in  a  trolley 
car;  for  C  to  expend  his  time  and  strength  in  walking? 

Define  a  luxury  in  your  own  case. 

What  should  be  the  Christian  steward’s  attitude  in 
the  matter  of  holding  the  stock  or  sharing  in  the  profits 
of  a  concern  which  is  not  operated  on  a  Christian 
basis  in  reference  to  sanitary  environment,  just  wages 
and  fair  hours  of  labor? 

Dr.  Sneath  of  Yale  recently  enunciated  the  following 
as  some  of  the  fundamental  economic  virtues.  Can  you 
name  any  others  which  the  Christian  steward  should 
exhibit? 

1.  One  of  the  most  basic  economic  virtues  is 
honesty.  The  old  saying,  “Honesty  is  the  best  policy,” 
cannot  be  disputed  from  the  economic  point  of  view, 
business  could  not  flourish  long  on  a  basis  of  dishon¬ 
esty.  The  dishonest  employer  or  employee  may  sur¬ 
vive  awhile,  but  his  day  is  brief.  In  all  human  rela¬ 
tions,  honesty  is  one  of  the  obligations  that  our  moral 
nature  imposes  upon  us,  because  it  makes  for  the 
highest  good  of  man.  (See  Romans  12:17;  13:13;  2 
Corinthians  8:21;  Hebrews  13:18).  Good  stewardship 
demands  honesty  in  labor  as  well  as  in  business  deal¬ 
ing.  Every  man  must  give  value  for  value  in  every  re- 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  1 0 1 


lation  of  life.  Taking  wages  for  poor  work  or  for 
“soldiering”  is  dishonest. 

2.  Fidelity  is  another  economic  virtue.  The  em¬ 
ployer  should  be  faithful  to  his  full  stewardship  in¬ 
cluding  his  responsibility  to  his  employees.  The  work¬ 
man  should  be  faithful  in  his  work.  He  should  make 
the  best  use  of  his  time,  the  best  use  of  his  ability  and 
the  best  use  of  his  opportunities.  An  employee  should 
be  genuinely  devoted  to  his  employer’s  interests  but 
more  particularly  to  his  own  ideals  and  self-respect. 
Fidelity  is  both  an  economic  and  a  moral  obligation — 
no  matter  how  humble  or  how  exalted  the  task — and  its 
practice  carries  with  it  the  satisfaction  of  a  good  con¬ 
science.  This  is  doubtless,  the  lesson  of  Jesus’  story 
of  “The  Talents.”  The  story  teaches  a  lesson  in  fidelity 
— :a  faithful  use  of  the  measure  of  one’s  ability  and  the 
consequences.  “A  faithful  man  shall  abound  in  bless¬ 
ings.”  (Proverbs  28  :20)  See  also  Titus  2  :10. 

3.  Efficiency.  One  can  hardly  stress  too  much  the 
importance  of  this  virtue  in  the  economic  world.  Here 
again  we  meet  with  an  old  adage  that  is  eminently  true  : 
“What  is  worth  doing  is  worth  doing  well.”  Every 
one,  whether  he  be  in  business  for  himself  directing  the 
destinies  of  others,  or  in  the  employ  of  another,  should 
familiarize  himself  with  the  best  methods  of  doing  his 
work  and  then  try  to  put  them  into  practice  for  the 
good  of  all  alike.  The  Christian  steward  will  count 
his  efficiency  as  a  trust  to  use  not  only  to  increase  his 
own  wealth,  but  to  improve  the  working  conditions  and 
increase  wage  returns  for  his  workmen.  (See  1  Corin¬ 
thians  9:19-27;  2  Corinthians  5:9,  10;  1  Corinthians 
3  :9,  10).  The  use  of  time  and  strength  in  doing  inferior 
work,  producing  an  imperfect  or  shoddy  product,  is  a 
cardinal  sin.  Efficiency  in  one’s  work  is  a  prime  re¬ 
quirement  of  Christian  stewardship. 


102 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


4.  Economy.  This,  too,  is  a  virtue  of  prime  impor¬ 
tance  in  the  work  of  the  world.  The  corresponding 
vice  is  waste.  Promptness,  regularity,  system,  make 
for  productivity.  Their  opposites  lessen  it.  In  indus¬ 
try  there  should  be  thrifty  management  for  the  com¬ 
mon  weal.  Extravagance  is  often  the  cause  of  envy 
and  bitterness  on  the  part  of  the  poor  and  is  a  sign  that 
the  spirit  of  Christ  has  not  yet  prevailed  in  the  think¬ 
ing  of  some  to  whom  much  has  been  given  and  from 
whom  much  will  be  required.  (See  Luke  15:11-32; 
John  6:12). 

5.  Ambition  is  an  important  economic  virtue.  A 
man’s  work  should  not  be  regarded  as  a  “grind.”  His 
work  should  be  his  pleasure  and  inspiration.  He 
should  be  ambitious  not  only  to  do  well  but  to  excel. 
It  is  for  his  own  interests  that  he  should  be  spurred  on 
by  ambition.  One  should  not  be  content  to  rest  in  pres¬ 
ent  attainment.  Like  Paul  in  the  spiritual  sphere,  so 
in  the  economic  realm  he  should  “stretch  forward  to 
the  things  that  are  before.”  (Philippians  3:13). 

6.  Patience  and  Perseverance.  These  closely  allied 
virtues  belong  to  the  economic  as  well  as  to  the  other 
spheres  of  human  activity.  They  are  very  necessary 
virtues.  In  all  work  there  are  discouraging  circum¬ 
stances.  Many  difficulties  arise  ;  progress  is  often  slow  ; 
there  are  many  failures ;  promotions  are  always  tardy ; 
merit  does  not  always  receive  full  recognition,  etc. 
These  things  tend  to  impatience  and  discouragement. 
Such  circumstances  are  a  test  of  character.  They  call 
for  patience  and  perseverance.  Results  in  both  the 
economic  and  spiritual  worlds  demand  their  exercise. 
“Behold  the  husbandman  waiteth  for  the  precious 
fruits  of  the  earth,  being  patient  over  it,  until  it  receives 
the  early  and  latter  rain.  Be  ye  also  patient.”  (James 
5  :7)  The  same  is  true  of  perseverance.  In  the  economic 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  1 03 


and  more  strictly  spiritual  worlds  the  injunction  ap¬ 
plies:  “And  let  us  not  be  weary  in  well  doing;  for  in 
due  season  we  shall  reap,  if  we  faint  not.” — Galatians 
6:9. 

7.  Justice.  Virtues  more  or  less  overlap.  This  is 
the  ease  with  the  virtues  to  which  attention  has  already 
been  called.  This  is  true  also  of  justice.  In  many  re¬ 
spects  it  is  fundamental  and  inclusive.  To  be  just  is 
to  be  honest,  faithful,  economical,  patient,  persevering, 
etc.  Justice  is  used  here  as  not  only  including  these  ob¬ 
ligations,  but  also  as  including  all  that  is  involved  in 
the  so-called  “rights”  of  man.  (Luke  6:31;  Matthew 
22:34-40;  Matthew  18:2-16).  The  Christian  steward 
will  refuse  to  claim  for  himself  any  thing  he  is  unwill¬ 
ing  to  grant  to  others.  There  can  be  no  contemptuous 
treatment  of  our  fellow  men,  nothing  of  unfair  taking 
advantage  of  another’s  weakness,  need,  ignorance  or 
extremity  on  the  part  of  a  Christian  steward. 

The  Christian  law  of  all  social  relations,  including 
the  economic,  is  “Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbor  as  thy¬ 
self.”  Applied  to  industry,  it  is  mutually  obligatory 
upon  those  who  employ  and  upon  those  who  are  em¬ 
ployed.  How  far  do  you  feel  that  you  have  been  prac¬ 
ticing  these  stewardship  ideals  in  your  work  and  busi¬ 
ness  ? 

Without  question  the  urgent  need  of  the  hour  is 
the  acceptance  and  practice  of  stewardship  in  the 
making  of  money.  If  we  could  enlist  the  rank  and 
tile  of  professing  Christians  in  the  practice  of  Stew¬ 
ardship  in  their  work  and  business,  we  would  be 
far  on  the  way  to  the  establishment  of  the  Kingdom 
of  God  on  earth.  If  Christian  men  and  women  with 
utter  devotion  to  Christ  undertake  with  diligence  and 
goodwill  in  the  spirit  of  service  and  not  for  selfish 
gain  the  production  of  the  things  needed  to  give 


f04  LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


comfort,  full  life  and  satisfaction  to  the  whole  race, 
it  would  change  the  whole  spirit  of  life.  Especial¬ 
ly  should  young  people  study  how  to  bring  into  indus¬ 
try  and  trade,  into  the  professions  and  into  art  and 
science  and  into  every  sort  of  work  these  ideals  of  our 
Christian  stewardship.  It  is  needful,  if  these  chal¬ 
lenging  ideals  are  not  to  be  mere  sentimentalism  in  our 
minds,  to  set  for  ourselves  rigid  and  high  standards  of 
economic  behavior. 


ONE  LEVEL  HEADED  BUSINESS  MAN 
RECENTLY  SAID: 

“It  is  perfectly  clear  to  me  that  we  are  coming 
to  a  place  in  this  and  other  nations  where  we 
must  choose  between  Christian  Stewardship 
and  Radical  Socialism — between  recognizing 
the  actual  ownership  of  God  and  administer¬ 
ing  ‘his  property’  as  a  stewardship,  and  a 
radical  state  ownership  in  which  force  and 
terrorism  shall  attempt  to  make  a  distribu¬ 
tion  of  property  and  wealth  more  fair  than 
that  which  now  exists.” 


The  end  of  this  study  brings  us  again  to  the  be¬ 
ginning  of  Study  I.  After  we  have  established  the  prin¬ 
ciples  of  stewardship  in  our  attitude  and  purpose  and 
method  in  our  business  we  are  again  face  to  face  with 
God’s  ownership  of  all  we  have  earned  in  business  and 
the  need  of  administering  for  him  in  the  giving,  spend¬ 
ing  and  saving  of  our  incomes.  It  will  help  us  to 
maintain  our  lives  at  the  stewardship  level  in  acquisi¬ 
tion,  where  the  difficulties  are  greatest  and  where 
we  have  to  meet  many  antagonists,  if  we  carefully 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  105 


observe  stewardship  principles  in  our  own  giving  and 
spending  and  saving  where  one’s  own  decisions  are  so 
completely  final.  God’s  ownership  and  our  responsibil¬ 
ity  will  be  remembered  better  in  every  sphere  if  we 
fully  practice  Stewardship  in  the  use  of  our  money. 
We  must  keep  ourselves  strong  in  the  expression  of 
our  acceptance  of  stewardship  in  the  sphere  of  the  use 
of  our  money  while  we  are  seeking  earnestly  to  carry 
on  the  harder  task  of  actually  putting  our  stewardship 
ideals  into  operation  in  the  sphere  of  the  getting  of 
our  money.  It  will  require  much  adjustment  and 
long-involved  processes  to  put  at  work  in  any  thor¬ 
ough-going  way  these  high  stewardship  concepts  in 
our  business  life  and  relationship.  They  will  come, 
it  is  very  certain,  for  Christ  is  to  rule  and  in  everything 
to  have  the  preeminence.  Many  concerns  are  now 
honestly  trying  to  practice  these  ideals  and  succeeding, 
even  though  not  perfectly.  Many  interesting  accounts 
of  experiments  in  business  stewardship  are  available 
for  study.  See  leaflets  and  pamphlets  of  Proctor  and 
Gamble  (Ivory  Soap)  ;  The  Arthur  T.  Nash  Clothing- 
Company ;  The  Dutchess  Bleachery;  The  American 
Cast  Iron  Pipe  Co. ;  The  Dennison  Company  and  Endi- 
cott  Johnson  Shoe  Company. 

To  keep  ourselves  fit  for  this  difficult  job  of  making 
the  acquisition  of  money  a  Christian  process,  we  must 
begin  the  practice  of  the  stewardship  requirements  set 
forth  in  the  first  four  lessons  in  the  matter  of  spending, 
saving  and  giving.  We  must  set  aside  with  religious 
scrupulousness  the  separated  portions  of  our  money, 
time,  personality,  etc.,  by  which  we  acknowledge 
God’s  ownership  of  all.  In  the  case  of  our  time  we 

shall  always  give  at  least  the  seventh  and  generally 
more.  In  the  case  of  our  money,  the  separated  portion 
will  never  be  less  than  a  tenth  unless  we  are  convinced 


106 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


that  God  has  explicitly  set  some  other  percentage  for 
ns.  Generally  the  Christian  steward  will  set  aside 
more  than  the  tenth,  increasing  the  amount  as  God 
prospers  him. 

Review  again  the  questions  raised  in  Study  II  as  to 
the  disbursement  of  this  separated  portion  of  our 
money  in  and  through  the  church  and  for  other  good 
and  rightful  causes.  William  P.  Merrill  says  “Stew¬ 
ardship  is  not  met  by  compliance  with  the  law  of  the 
tithe.  But  the  law  is  so  practical  as  to  make  it  a  part 
of  wisdom  to  adopt  it.  Stewardship  involves  how¬ 
ever  more  than  giving  definitely,  liberally  and  consci¬ 
entiously  to  the  work.  First  it  means  that  one  shall 
put  his  money  not  where  he  wants  to  put  it  but  where 
the  business  needs  it.  -The  ‘Owner’  may  put  his  money 
as  he  sees  fit  but  the  steward  must  put  it  where  loyalty 
to  the  Owner  demands.  Second,  it  means  a  steward 
must  work  with  an  organization  so  that  when  a  solic¬ 
itor  comes  for  your  subscription  you  are  to  welcome 
him,  not  beat  him  off.  In  other  words,  you  are  to  work 
with  those  in  charge.  Third,  it  means  that  we  handle 
trust  funds  if  we  are  stewards.  A  capitalist  need  not 
report  to  any  but  himself,  but  a  steward  must  render 
an  account”  (Consider  also  the  apportioning  of  the 
other  trusts  we  have  to  these  various  causes). 

In  the  matter  of  the  rest  of  our  incomes  left  after 
setting  aside  our  Separated  Portion  we  will  want  to 
think  through  again  the  suggestions  on  Budgeting  and 
Spending  and  Saving  given  in  the  Studies  III  and  IV 
so  as  to  use  our  entire  resource  in  the  ways  which  will 
be  in  accord  with  the  Father’s  will  and  best  promote 
the  cause  of  the  Kingdom. 

Will  you  again  reaffirm  your  acceptance  of  the  stew¬ 
ardship  principles  and  sign  the  declaration  found  on 
page  86  of  Study  IV? 


BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  SERVICE  107 


If  you  have  not  yet  made  the  following  declaration, 
“IN  LOVING  LOYALTY  TO  MY  LORD  I  SET 

APART  AT  LEAST  A  TENTH  OF  MY  NET  IN¬ 
COME  TO  GIVE  TO  HIS  SERVICE,”  are  you  now 
solemnly  and  reverently,  trusting  in  God’s  strength, 
ready  to  say,  “I  will?” 

QUESTIONS  ON  STUDY  V 

BUSINESS  FOR  PROFITS  OR  BUSINESS 

AS  SERVICE 

1.  When  really  should  Stewardship  begin? 

2.  What  place  does  giving  have  in  Stewardship? 
Does  God  exempt  from  Stewardship  those  whose 
wages  or  profits  are  small? 

3.  Must  the  business  man  retire  from  business  in 
order  to  serve  God?  Is  it  enough  to  serve  God  in  odd 
moments  of  one’s  spare  time? 

4.  Is  the  ministry  the  only  divine  calling?  How  may 
we  make  every  other  kind  of  service  high  and  holy  ? 
Do  you  think  the  following  are  entitled  to  be  con¬ 
sidered  consecrated  workers,  and  if  so,  why 

(a)  The  teacher  (f)  The  sailor 

(b)  The  lawyer  (g)  The  jeweller 

(c)  The  farmer  (h)  The  actor 

(d)  The  newspaperman  (i)  The  poet 

(e)  The  street-sweeper  (j)  The  sculptor 

5.  What  must  be  the  Christian’s  motive  for  making 
money?  Is  it  a  legitimate  motive  to  conduct  a  business 
enterprise  for  the  purpose  of  becoming  a  multi-million¬ 
aire?  For  the  purpose  of  accumulating  enough  wealth 


108 


LIFE  AS  A  STEWARDSHIP 


to  keep  one’s  children  in  luxury  all  their  lives?  For  the 
purpose  of  gaining  social  prestige? 

6.  What  do  you  think  would  be  the  effect  upon  in¬ 
dustry  of  Christianizing  it?  Would  there  be  any  room 
for  selfishness?  dishonesty?  shirking?  unsanitary  work¬ 
ing  conditions?  inadequate  wages? 

7.  Could  a  sincere  Christian  steward  hold  stock  in  a 
factory  that  employed  children  under  legal  age?  In  a 
business  that  profiteered  on  such  necessities  as  milk, 
ice,  etc.?  Could  he  accept  income  from  the  rent  of  un¬ 
sanitary,  unsafe  tenements? 

8.  Name  and  discuss  some  of  Dr.  Sneath’s  list  of 
economic  virtues.  Are  these  virtues  to  be  practiced  by 
the  employee  alone?  Can  they  be  effective  unless 
practiced  by  the  employer  too? 

9.  What  has  stewardship  in  business  to  do  with  the 
establishing  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth? 

10.  Do  you  think  it  is  harder  to  practice  Stewardship 
in  the  giving  of  money  or  in  the  acquiring  of  money? 
Why?  Name  some  American  business  firms  that  have 
tried  to  put  into  practice  Stewardship  in  the  acquisition 
of  money.  Try  to  find  out  more  about  them  and  others. 
What  have  you  gained  spiritually  by  the  study  of 

these  ? 

11.  Write  out  a  short  summary  of  all  five  lessons. 


INDEX 


Abraham,  27 
Account 

God  requires  an,  45 
Accounting, 
accurate  necessary,  47 
Acquisition, 
of  wealth,  86 
Acknowledgment, 
of  Stewardship,  18,  24,  30,  85 
Adam,  28 
Ambition,  102 

American  Cast  Iron  Pipe  Co.,  105 
Asceticism,  6,  33 

Babcock,  Maltbie,  B.  21 
Babel.  28 

Babson,  Roger  W.,  62 
Babylonia,  26 
Batten,,  S.  Z.,  98 

Bennett,  Arnold,  48 
Bookkeeping, 
required,  43,  45 
free  from  legalism,  45 
Budget, 

charts  of  typical  budgets,  59,  60 
defined,  47 
parable  on,  44 
Christians  should,  45 
of  prayer,  52 
personal  and  family,  57 
of  time.  44,  50 
Budget  Book,  53 
Business, 
a  stewardship,  15 
for  profits  or  service,  107 
to  be  Christian,  94 

Calkins,  H.  R.,  26 
Carey,  William,  93 
Century,  The,  95 
China,  26 

Christ’s  sayings,  54 
Church  support,  35 

Dennison  Tag  Co.,  105 
Divine  Ownership, 

Bible  references,  7,  11,  13 
denied  by  men,  God  has  brought 
them  to  judgment,  11 
emphasized  by  Jesus,  11 
never  annulled,  11 
of  all  things  is  the  fundamental 
word  in  the  stewardship  idea,  23 
God’s  absolute  dominion,  29 
we  constantly  need  a  definite 
reminder,  28 
acknowledgment  of, 
and  our  responsibility,  105 
Dutchess  Bleachery,  105 


Economy,  102 
Edison,  74 
Efficiency.  101 
Egypt,  26 

Endicott,  Johnson  Shoe  Co.,  105 
Ethiopians,  27 
Eliot,  George,  89 

Fellowship  of  Stewardship,  86 
Fidelity,  101 

Gifts,  God’s,  71 
the  increase,  9 
power  to  make  money,  10 
Giving, 

not  the  first  thing  in  Steward¬ 
ship,  90 

must  determine  spending  and 
saving,  34,  56 
systematic,  35 
scriptural  rules,  83 
spasmodic,  55 
Gad’s  sovereignty 
denied,  life  ceases  to  be  partner¬ 
ship,  5 

acknowledged  it  becomes  a  re¬ 
sponsibility,  6 
Golden  Rule  Method 
of  dividing  our  church  gifts,  36 
Goucher,  J.  E.,  10 
Gordon,  S.  D.,  68 
Grayson,  David,  29 
Grotius,  27 

Honesty,  100 

India,  26 

Jacob,  27 
Jews 

amount  of  separated  portion,  40 
Jowett,  J.  H.,  36,  46.  55,  70 
Justice,  103 

Kennedy,  John  Stewart,  55 
Kingsley,  Charles,  50 

Legalism, 

bookkeeping  and  budgeting 
keep  free  from,  45 
Levitical  Law,  32 
Life, 

a  trust,  a  stewardship,  14 
is  a  power  which  we  are  to 
use,  15 

Lowry,  Oscar,  27 
Lucullus,  28 
Luther,  Martin,  9 
Luxury,  41,  99 


no 


INDEX 


Man’s  ownership, 
circumscribed  by  God’s  rights 
as  owner,  11 
Melchizedek,  27 
McConaughy,  David,  27 
Merrill,  William  P.,  106 
Money, 

parables  dealing  with,  71 

most  talked  of  topic  in  Bible,  71 

The  Acid  Test,  99 

duty  to  make,  91 

slogan  of  Y.  M.  C.  A.,  87 

Christianized,  81 

coined  manhood,  74 

stored  power,  75 

perils  of,  73  , 

a  miracle,  74, 

what  your  money  will  do,  76 
reveals  men,  77 
a  missionary,  77 
not  the  root  of  all  evil,  73 
Mosaic  Law,  26,  32 

Nash,  the  Arthur  T.  Clothing  Co., 
105 

Noah,  28 

Ownership,  (See  Divine  Owner¬ 
ship) 

confused  with  dominion,  28 
Parables, 

emphasize  divine  ownership,  11,71 
Partnership, 

use  of,  in  place  of  “steward”,  11 
defined,  13 
Patience,  102 
Patterson,  John  H. 

National  Cash  Register  Co.,  50 
Perseverance,  102 
Personality,  stewardship  of,  17 
Pharisee, 

attitude  to  be  avoided,  47 
Pliny,  27 
Possessions, 

Bible  teaching,  5 
accountibility  for  possessions,  5 
intended  to  be  channels  of  grace, 
73 

Power,  stewardship  of,  17 
Prayer, 

budgeting  of,  52 
stewardship  of,  15 
as  service,  16 

a  trust  to  be  used  for  God,  15 
Proctor  and  Gamble,  105 
Proportioning,  31 

Quayle,  31 

Rank  imposes  obligation,  17 
Rauschenbusch,  99 
Robertson,  A.  T.,  6 
Saving, 

a  Christian  obligation,  38 


Schauffler,  A.  F.,  74 

Self-Sacrifice,  34 

Service, 

Full  Time,  16 

Separated  Portion, 
how  divide,  34 
defined,  24,  25 

not  to  finance  the  Kingdom  of 
God,  30,  35 

recognition  of  God’s  ownership, 
30 

of  time  and  personality  as  well 
as  money,  22 

the  sign  of  personal  fellowship 
with  God,  32 

safe-guarded  from  all  legalism, 
24 

recognizes  God’s  sovereign  own¬ 
ership,  25 

is  not  systematic  giving,  25 
administration  of,  35 

Sill,  Edgar  Rowland,  67 

Sneath,  100 

Steward, 

Christian,  conceives  his  work  as 
a  holy  calling,  93 
portions  of  all  his  abilities  should 
be  used  as  acknowledgment  of 
divine  ownership,  22 
set  aside  at  least  a  tenth,  in¬ 
creasing  the  amount  as  God 
prospers  him,  106 
in  his  business  relations  should 
count  himself  to  be  a  partner 
with  God,  92 
a  producer  of  values,  98 
only  compulsion  is  loving  loy¬ 
alty,  13 

.Stewardship, 

our  spending  and  saving  as  well 
as  giving,  19 

measure  of  the  genuineness  of 
our  faith,  76 

pf  money,  requires  four  things,  94 
in  money,  helps  in  stewardship 
of  the  whole  life,  83 
defined,  11,  12,  85 
royal  doctrine  of,  14 
New  Testament  concept  of,  14 
makes  us  accountable,  16 
of  savings,  39 

positively  no  limitation  to  its 
claims,  17 

Bible’s  way  of  saying  all  we  are 
and  have  belongs  to  God,  7,  17 
makes  the  acquiring  of  wealth 
a  holy  calling,  93 
impossible  to  discharge  by  tith¬ 
ing  merely,  22 

recognition  of  God’s  ownership,  30 
must  be  spontaneous,  13  ,, 

is  the  Christian  law  of  life,  14 

Strong,  Josiah,  39,  91 


INDEX 


1  1  1 


Talent, 

constitutes  a  stewardship,  91 
special,  used  for  God’s  Kingdom, 
23 
Time, 

a  trust,  15 
Tithe, 

giving  of,  is  not  Stewardship,  19 
is  the  Lord’s,  39 
sanction  of,  31 
Tithing, 

very  ancient,  27 


Trusteeship, 
defined,  12 

Wilson,  Robert  Dick,  50 
Widow’s  mite,  19,  33 
Young  People’s  Society,  67 
Young  Men’s  Christian  Association 
Slogan  used  in  National  Thrift 
Week,  87 

Zarephath,  woman  of,  81 
Zaccheus,  54,  79 


Date  Due 


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